LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

t'liap. Copyright Ko. 

I 90 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



NOV 10 mi 



YAWPS 



AND OTHER THINGS 



BY 

WILLIAM J. LAMPTON 



'• Merely a Yawpist yawping his simple yawp 
of things that are and not what they may 
seem. ' ' 



philadelphia 
Henry Altemus Company 



74:038 



1 •:■.»'»», V 'i.,:'i-Oonr:' '■.<?'*<« 

Hoy 10 1900 i 

r.^^^''^ COPY. 
NOV 20 I9UU 



[NOV 



O'^-^i 






K^ 



Copyright, 1900, by 

HBMRY ALTEKTia COKPAMT. 



'T'HIS book of Yawps is dedica- 
^ ted to the memory of the 
late Charles A. Dana, an editor 
who knew a good thing when he 
saw it, — and printed it. 



CONTENTS. 

Preface 9 

Some Incongruvial Remarks 11 

By Way of Introduction 15 

1900 19 

George Washington's Address, 1900 23 

January Eighth, 1889 26 

Thomas B. Reed in Rome 28 

Owed to the Ground Hog 31 

Pie 33 

Pro Bono Publico 36 

TheTowpath Mule 38 

Oh, Sorosis ! 42 

Kentucky to the Front 44 

The War-ship Kentucky's Appeal 45 

The Prince of Wales has a Cold 48 

A Hint of Spring 50 

An Easter Eeru S2 

The Day of Hats 54 

Parks and Spring 56 

Funston of Kansas 59 

5 



6 CONTENTS. 

Page. 

A Good Woman 62 

The "Brother to the Ox " 64 

The Love of Woman 68 

Memorial Day, 1 900 70 

The Prose of Poetry 73 

The Sweet Girl Graduate -75 

Lo, The Summer Girl 80 

The Shirt Waist 84 

The Humidity 87 

The Electric Fan 91 

An Enigma 95 

The Shirt-waist Man 96 

Larchmont's Shirt-waist Hop 99 

The Automobile loi 

Maud Miller 104 

Ready — if Needed 105 

Hymen's Speech 107 

Concerning a Day no 

In Washinp;ton 112 

A Blaze of Glory 115 

The Speedway, New York 117 

For Future Reference 120 

A Fantasy 123 

A Lay of the Ancients 125 



CONTENTS. 7 

Pagb. 

Chicago Phonetics 127 

In Chrysanthemumiam 129 

To The W. C. T. U. Convention 131 

Another County Heard From >-. "i-^-^^'-*^-P ■:■-."' . 134 

Some Texas Peculiarities 136 

Consul-General Lee's Remarks 138 

The Passing of the Summer Girl 140 

Milk and Music 142 

The One Man Power 145 

The Excelsioric Umpire 147 

The Third Party Drives Up 149 

Labor Day, 1900 •••... 152 

A Sage of Chicago Remarks 156 

Response of the American People 159 

School Begins 162 

Commodore Cannon 165 

The New York Police on Parade 167 

The Language of Progress 171 

Count Waldersee's Command 173 

The Discovery of America 176 

Thanksgiving 179 

To the LVth Congress 183 

Merry Christmas 187 

The Superfluous Speak 190 



PREFACE. 

WHAT shall an author say in the preface to 
his first book? Possibly he would better 
commend his soul to its Maker and let come 
what might come. In this instance, he feels a 
shade easier in his mind, because many of these 
verses have already appeared in the columns of 
The New York Sun, a no mean critic itself, so that 
the worst is over. However, there is something 
more mysterious, more mystifying, more awesome, 
about a book than can possibly exist in the news 
paper, and even now the Author makes his appear- 
ance with a consciousness that is embarrassingly 
uncomfortable, the result, though it be, of his as- 
sured knowledge that he is not the first author to 
have written a book, and that his book is not the 
greatest and best ever submitted to a discriminat- 
ing public. 

But the Author of these "Yawps," as he has 
called them, does claim for them a peculiarity of 
form and expression not common to conventional 

9 



lo PREFACE 

versification, which may do for them in a book 
what it has already done for them in the news- 
papers. If a place for the Yawpist is made 
somewhere in the line that leads to Poet, the 
object of the book will have been accomplished, 
because only the good opinion of many readers 
can effect such a result — and many readers is the 
earnest prayer of every author, to which every 
publisher fervently responds — "Amen." 

The Author. 
New York City. 



SOME INCONGRUVIAL 
REMARKS. 

I SHALL not undertake in a brief prefatory 
word like this to offer a formal presentation 
of my principal. Those who do not know him 
will do well to make his acquaintance. 

Although an original, Mr. Lampton is not a 
first offender. There have been others. Yet in 
the new era of news in rhyme and versified wis- 
dom, he came with the pioneers ; with Stanton 
and Hale, and the rest ; the successors of Prentice 
and Hatcher and Albert Roberts. Theirs was a 
nimble and a current wit. His is not less so — 
though he has amplified and modernized their art, 
bringing it, as the saying hath it, to "date." It 
may not be the art of Michel Angelo or of Alfred 
Tennyson ; but Hood and Hook and Praed prac- 
ticed it and Kipling had to learn it. Sometimes 
I have thought these men could do more even 
than they attempted. Hood actually did when 
he tried ; Kipling is young yet ; though Lampton, 
if he aims not high, misses never the mark ; and 



12 SOME INCONGRUVIAL REMARKS. 

that is a great matter. There are always smiles 
and often buttercups and daisies and sometimes 
tears in his lines. Very few poets can say as 
much for their more ambitious effusions. 

How far he may be heralded hereafter as the 
founder of a school of poetry the fate of this 
book will tell. Since he has himself referred to 
the sweat of his typewriter, the added labors of 
his Mergenthaler must not be forgotten ; for your 
machine-made poetry, steel-clad from start to 
finish, requires a more extensive plant than was 
known to Shakespeare himself; and it may be 
doubted whether if Ben Jonson were brought to 
life and required to furnish such verses to order 
after this pattern, he would not rub his eyes and 
ask to be led back to the cloisters. ** From gay 
to grave, from lively to severe " is but a part of 
it ; nor indeed the greater part ; even when cop- 
per-bottomed it must be spontaneous ; when case- 
mated, inspired ; melodious, too, yet permeated 
by the rugged wisdom of the time, the common 
sense and parle, of the streets ; catching the fore- 
lock of that dizzy blonde, the rude humor of the 
town, as she threads her way betwixt the country- 
house and the curb-stone, the breakfast table and 
the lunch-counter ; all things to all men, accord- 
ing to the injunction of St. Paul. The daily 



SOME INCONGRUVIAL REMARKS. 13 

journal has driven literature to the wall. Hence- 
forth the poets must bloom in the morning paper 
or not at all. Mr. Lampton makes his hay whilst 
the sun shines, and, though these collected lays 
and rays be but moonbeams, canned moonbeams, 
so to say, yet like the sun that shines for all, they 
have not lost their illuminating power and will be 
hailed with right good will by thousands who will 
recognize them in their new dress as old friends. 



Louisville, September 15, 1900. 






BY WAY OF INTRO- 
DUCTION. 

No POET, I 

Who sings about a sapphire sky, 

Or silver sanded streams, 

Or dim deHcious dreams, 

Or birds, 

Or lowing herds, 

Or flowers fair 

Upon the fragrant air, 

Or hearts that throb, 

Or souls that sob, 

Or forty dozen other things 

Of which the poetry poet sings 

Out of his soulful sufferinofs, 

But merely a Yawpist 

Yawping his simple yawp 

Of things that are 

And not what they may seem 

To those poetic fancies that 

Seldom tumble 

To where the real thing is at. 



t6 yawps 

A YAWPIST then 

Am I ; and men 

And things, beneath the touch 

Of yawpery, 

Appear as such 

In rhyme or rhythm, 

Or having neither with 'em, 

And yet not less 

In natural fitting dress, 

Because the yawp 

Is nature's own expression. 

It says just what 

Pale poesy does not 

And in exactly the way 

That you would say 

It yourself, if you had 

Thought of it 

Soon enough. 

See? 

It rhythms 

When it rhythms, 

And it rhymes 

Sometimes, 

But whether it does 

Or not. 

It gets there 

Just the same, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 

Which is where the yawp 

Has got 

The bulge on a lot 

Of contemporaneous 

And other modern and ancient 

Literature. 

The poet may rear up and kick 

And say it makes him sick, 

But gee whiz, 

Is there a more powerful production 

Than the simple yawp is ? 



17 



2— Yawps, 



1900. 

Hail, 1900, 

Let the bells ring out, 

And let the shout 

Of millions, undismayed. 

And not afraid 

Of the future by what 

The past has not. 

Been to them, or has been, 

Join in the merry din 

Of welcome to you. Let 

The world forget 

Its trials, and in the new time here, 

Feel only that good cheer 

Which comes to all 

If they will call 

It with the spirit of the strong 

Which moves mankind along 

The paths that rise 

Above the earth's low reaches to the skies. 

The past is dead : 

We go ahead 

19 



20 YAWPS 

To newer, better things ; 

The poet sings 

A new song, and his strains 

Allure us to nobler gains ; 

To higher thought, 

Wrought 

Out of what we were. 

Therefore, 1900, be 

It resolved, that we — 

However, we've sworn off on resolutions. 

Listen to us, now, New Year ; 

Hear 

Us as we shout 

And let our spirits out : 

You see that flag there ? 

None so fair 

In all the world, and none so fit 

To wave in any part of it. 

And watch her wave, and spread 

Until the starry Red, 

White and Blue is all men's Flag, 

And every other rag 

Of Empire bows to it ; the free 

Man's Flag that was and is and will be; 

And watch our trade 

Fill up the road the Flag has made, 

And keep it full ; 



AND OTHER THINGS. 21 

We need no pull 

But that 

To show the world where we are at ; 

And watch us grow 

At home in all the things that go 

To make a State 

Imperial — meaning great 

And good and true ; 

That's the Red, White and Blue. 

And every one beneath it, 

Great and small, 

Will answer to the call 

The greater makes upon him, and you'll see 

The kind of men all men should be. 

Out of its tears and its sorrows 

Into its glad to-morrows ; 

Out of its wars and its strife 

Into its peaceful life ; 

Out of its gloom and its shadows 

Into its ever-green meadows ; 

Out of its clouds and its gray 

Into its better way. 

Oh, say, 

1900, you ought to stay over 

A year or two and see 

The kind of a country and people 

Our country and people will be. 



22 YAWPS 

You can't? No? 
Do you have to go ? 
What a pity ! Yet 
We shall not forget 
The start you will give us. 
And we cannot fail. 
So hail, 1900! 
All hail! All hail! 



AND OTHER THINGS. 33 



GEORGE WASHINGTON'S 
ADDRESS TO HIS COUN- 
TRY IN 1900. 

Say, Eagle, 

Ain't we great? 

Ain't we really immense ? 

Ain*t we the greatest 

That ever happened ? 

From your lofty perch on 

The palladium of our liberties 

Sweep your piercing eye around 

The wide horizon and see for yourself. 

There is nothing like us 

On earth. 

And we are getting more different 

Every minute. 

By Jiminy Christmas, 

I had no idea when I started in 

With this country 

Where we were coming out. 

Why, you havn't more than 



24 YAWPS 

Got out of your shell, 

And now your wings 

Spread from the clustered Antilles 

To the splendors of the Orient ; 

And when you scream, 

The echoes hurtle round the world, 

And principalities and powers 

And decaying dynasties 

Take to the tall timber. 

And the Flag ; 

The glittering and glorious 

Star-Spangled Banner, 

Which Europe thought was merely 

A dishrag, 

When I first swung it to the breeze, 

Is now the 

Blooming bunting of a boundless bailiwick. 

And the Fourth of July? 

Well, say. Eagle, 

It's going to be the 

Birthday of half a world. 

Of which I am Father of the best part. 

And stepfather of the balance. 

You can roost on the ridge pole 

Of the Greater Republic 

And scream a lung out, 

But it won't be so much as a murmur 



AND OTHER THINGS. 25 

To the way I feel, 

This very minute ; 

And handicapped as I must be 

Under the circumstances, 

I'm with you in spirit, Old Baldy, 

And eveiy time you flap your wings 

And scream, 

I burst a button off. 

That's the kind of an expansionist I am, 

And if you will put 

A Star-Spangled girdle 

Round the world, 

I'll tie a knot in it 

That will stay tied, 

And don't you forget it. 

Go on with your spread. Oh Eagle, 

And Star-Spangled Banner fly high ; 

I'm with you forever, and wish you 

A perpetual Fourth of July. 



i6 YAWPS 



JANUARY EIGHTH, 1889 

There were lots of celebrations 

In the West and in the East ; 
There were viands and libations 

For the largest and the least ; 
There were speeches, speeches, speeches ; 

The torrent would not dam, 
When it turned upon the hero 

Who punched old Pakenham. 

They gloried in the glory 

Of a glorious past, and told, 
In hyperbolic story, 

Of the wondrous deeds of old; 
They pointed to the future, 

And saw on Vict'ry's brow 
A limb of lustrous laurel, 

They cannot see there now. 

At the time of all this blowing, 

'Way down in Tennessee 
A grim, gray ghost was showing 

Some signs of energy; 



AND OTHER THINGS. 27 

He sighed deep in his bosom, 
And now and then would cuss, 

The meanwhile turning over 
In his sarcophagus. 

He sat up, and intently, 

With hand up to his ear, 
He nodded, not quite gently. 

At most that he could hear. 
He listened to the buncombe. 

And thought of recent facts, 
Whereby his party' d got it 

Where chickens get the axe. 

He knew the wretched story, 

Which had disturbed him there : 
A triumph, transitory, 

Disaster and despair. 
Then hearing still the speaking. 

He shook his bony head, 
And groaned: "By the Eternal, 

I'm glad that I am dead!" 



28 YAWPS 



THOMAS B. REED IN ROME 

Behold me as I stand, 

Where Rome has stood 

For twice a thousand years 

And more ! 

Behold us both : 

Me and Rome ! 

And then, dear friends. 

Please give your eyes a rest. 

Rome has her history. 

And I have mine ; 

But Rome, although she sat 

Upon her seven hills 

And ruled the world, 

Never sat in the Speaker's chair 

Of the Fifty-first Congress 

And bossed that 

Megatherian aggregation 

As I did, 

And that is where I've got 

The bulge on Rome ! 



AND OTHER THINGS. 

Here in old Caesar's district 

I sit me down, and with my feet 

Upon his ancient mantlepiece 

I feel at home. 

Me and Caesar ! 

Twin stars that twinkle through all time ! 

Two iron heels that trod as one 

Upon the people's necks. 

And then we got it in our own ! 

By gosh ! dear friends, I don't like that 

A little bit. 

And Caesar didn't either. 

Although he didn't have a 

Word to say after it was over. 

For obvious reasons ! 

But Brutus wasn't a patching 

To Springer of Illinois, 

Or Rogers of Arkansas ; 

And Caesar has something 

To be thankful for ! 

I'm with you Rome, 

From the Passamaquoddy's 

Tumbling tide of saw logs 

To where the tawny Tiber flows, 

And we should organize 

A Reed and Roman Trust, 

And swipe the universe ! 



29 



30 YAWPS 

Are there objections ? 

I hear none. 

The ayes seem to have it ; 

The ayes have it ! 

Then let her go, Gallagher ! 

But I shall never think 

That in that elder day 

To be a Roman 

Was greater than to be Speaker 

Of the grand old Fifty-first, 

And don't you forget it ! 

That's what ! 



AND OTHER THINGS. 31 



OWED TO THE 
GROUND HOG. 

Oh Ground Hog, 

In your hours of ease, 

Uncertain, 

Coy and hard to please, 

Why give us nasty days like these? 

Why, 

If your shadow in the sun 

Is something 

That will make you run, 

Are you obliged to have it done? 

But, Ground Hog, 

Please remember that 

This year the sun 

Was nowhere at 

The shadow point, 

And you're a flat 

Prevaricator ; 

One who lies 

Without the hope of purse 



32 YAWPS 

Or prize; 

A fraud upon the cold, gray skies, 

Upon whose sunlessness 

You place 

A promise to the human race, 

That for, at least, 

A six weeks' space 

We'll have good weather. 

Now if you 

Could find much worse 

In skies of blue, 

Why are you not 

To that kind true? 

Git, Ground Hog, 

Git, 

Lest you inspire 

Mankind to rise 

In wrath. 

And fire 

You as a 

Meteor-illogical liar!! 



AND OTHER THINGS. 33 



PIE. 

"The consumption of pie is on the increase." — From The Sun's 
Report of the New York Pie Market. 

Oh Pie, 

Oh unassuming, shy 

And simple solace to our woes, 

This shows 

That you have come to stay. 

And, say ! 

Don't ever, ever, ever go away. 

What odds if some 

Assert that you are bum, 

A breeder of dyspepsia, and 

One-half the ills of all the land. 

They lie 

Oh Pie, 

For you're a peach — 

Sometimes ; and speech 

Falls flat in telling what 

You are as mince, served piping hot, or 

Sometimes cold. 

3 — y'awps. 



34 YAWPS 

And would Thanksgiving- be 

Thanksgiving half, if we 

Had not you there, 

So fat and filling, and so fair ? 

If there were nothing else but you, 

There would be thanks enough in that for two! 

And think of you in apple form, 

And lemon, too. 

White capp'd with fluff; 

And cocoanut, and sweet cream puff; 

And huckleberry^, deeply, beautifully blue, 

The time-tried color of the true; 

And pumpkin, or sweet potato, with a sauce 

Of spice and sherry that is boss ; 

And custard, dream of poet's pen, 

Materialized from cow and hen ; 

And myriad other kinds. 

Why, 

Pie. 

Of all the great bonanza finds 

Of culinary searching, you 

Are first and foremost. Who 

Will dare deny 

The potency and permanence 

The plenitude and pleasantness, 

The popularity of pie? 

Oh mystery and magic, we 



AND OTHER THINGS. 35 

Delight to stick our face in thee 

And take it out again to see 

The horseshoe of our teeth 

Set like a semi-cycle 

Into your midst; and then 

To do it several dozen times a^ain ! 

Meanwhile to feel 

The ecstasy no spirit can reveal 

Save thine ; to steal 

The rapture and the rhapsody 

Enfolded by thy pale periphery. 

Oh pie, 

Oh pure, propitious, prophylactic pie, 

You're IT. 

A large, luxuriant, luscious bit. 

Here's your good health, 

And ours ; 

And by the powers 

You're bound to be 

The proud precursor 

Of a National pie-eat-y. 



36 YAWPS 



PRO BONO PUBLICO. 

Said Judge Lent, of White Plains, New York, to a lot of unkempt 
foreigners applying for naturalization papers: "You foreigners must 
wash your hands and faces before coming before me. Water costs nothing 
and soap is cheap. I regard cleanliness as one of the most important 
qualifications of American citizenship, and will grant applications for 
citizenship with great pleasure if the applicant is clean and neat in 
appearance." 

From foreign lands beyond the seas, 
We've got a lot of refugees 
From kings and thrones and things like these, 
And they can share our liberties, 

But make 'em wash. 

In time they may become as great 
As any in affairs of state 
And other walks, and may create 
A name and power and vast estate, 
But make 'em wash. 

Our liberties are free as air, 
And every man can have his share 
With just as little thought or care 
Or cost to him as shall be fair, 

But make 'em wash. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 37 

Our soil is sacred, but its place 
Is not upon the hands and face 
Or bodies of an alien race 
Come hither to enjoy our grace, 

So make 'em wash. 

Man's morals are in great degree 
Contingent on his decency 
Of person, and the chance is he, 
Unclean in one, in all will be, 

So make 'em wash. 

Some say that dirt is no disgrace : 
Go to, it is. No dirty race 
Has ever yet attained a place 
That could be said to set the pace, 
So make 'em wash. 

Our liberties are free as air. 
Our Uncle Sam is just and fair, 
Our water is beyond compare. 
Our soap is famous everywhere. 
So make 'em wash, 
Make 'em wash ; 
Goldern 'em, make 'em wash. 



38 YAWPS 



THE TOWPATH MULE. 

Trenton, N. J., April 26. — The first of the electric motors to be intro- 
duced upon the Delaware and Raritan Canal for the propulsion of canal- 
boats arrived here to-day. It is said that this canal will be the first in 
the world to use the motors for towing. 

Good-by, old Mule, 

Old Towpath Mule, good-by 1 

And good gray mule. 

Or black or brown. 

Take off your crown. 

Worn all these years, 

And lay it down. 

Meanwhile our tears, 

Commingling with your own, 

Are splashed upon the throne 

From which you ruled 

The path, and tooled 

The gay canalboat 

As it hied 

Its slow, serene and pleasant way 

By wood and water-side. 

Past fertile fields 

Whose harvest yields 



AI^D OTHER THJNGS. S9 

Gave loads to you 

And plenty to 

The patient farmers who 

Lived easily and quite content. 

The gait you went 

Was fast enough for them, and they 

Asked for no quicker way 

Than yours. They knew 

Your footsteps passing through, 

And greeted you 

In passing, as a friend 

Arriving at a journey's end, 

By sluggish, sleepy towns you hauled 

Your boat ; while bawled 

Your loud commander on the deck, 

As though 'twere up to you to wreck 

The craft you were attached to, 

And which you 

Were bound to by such ties 

As would not break. 

Oh Mule, oh Towpath Mule ! 

A different school 

Of Progress now obtains, 

And lightning strains 

And tugs, where erstwhile you 

Hauled cargoes through, 

And with your iron-clad soles 



40 YAWPS 

Were wont to kick 

The towpath full of holes. 

Alack the day ! 

Alack the greed ! 

That make men need 

A quicker way 

Than that sure one of yours by which 

You ploughed the waters 

Of each dammed ditch, 

And made them fertile in the tolls 

They brought 

Out of the harvest you had wrought. 

Ah, Towpath Mule! 

It breaks our heart to think 

That you are now a broken link, 

So soon to be the last 

Between the present and the past. 

Farewell, late monarch of the path, 

It is the lightning hath 

Unsceptered you, not man, 

His puny plan 

You could forestall, 

But Heaven's call 

Was different. 

You are dethroned, uncrowned, 

Irrevocably downed ; 

But by the gods your memory lives 



AND OTHER THINGS. 41 

And shall 

As long as any old canal 
Holds water ; so be patient still 
Beneath the lightning's blow, 
The New-Time's will. 



42 YAWPS 



OH, SOROSIS! 

Note. — Sorosis has notified The Sun not to send any more reporters 
around, because it (she) does not want to see them and will not tell 
them anything. 

Sorosis, 

Sister of silence, 

Sybil and Sphinx, all hail ! 

Serene in thy superb 

Superiority which misses 

Sublimity only by a 

Scratch, thou sittest in the 

Shades of the infinite and well known 

Silence of thy 

Sex, while the 

Sun and the entire 

Solar system are 

Slugged in the 

Slats by the 

Severity of the sentence thou 

Superimposeth. And why 

Sorosis, 

Shrinkest thou so? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 43 

Surely the sweet solaces of thy 

Sanctified seclusion are not 

Sacred secrets for a 

Selfish and select few, when the 

Sempiternal sorrows of both the 

Softer and sterner sex are fairly 

Shrieking for 

Such satisfying sympathy as 

Sorosis alone can supply to 

Smitten souls. And why 

Swattest thou in the 

Solar plexus the 

Simple screed of the 

Scrivener who sings the song of thy 

Sinless sweetness 

So that an eager world may 

Slosh around in thy symphonies? 

Sorosis! Oh, 

Sorosis! why 

So shy? 

Swing wide thy gates once more ; 

Sweep outward from thy 

Sanctum, Sis, so as to 

Soothe and sanctify, and, perhaps to 

Swipe the scepter of mankind. 

See? 



44 YAWPS 



KENTUCKY TO THE FRONT. 

Frankfort, Ky., April 7, 1898. — Governor Bradley this morning 
made public a long list of prominent citizens who have offered their 
services for enlistment. 

Up from the bosky Bluegrass dells, 
Up from the Bourbon- flowing wells, 
Up from the Pea vine's tree-girt soil, 
Up from the Red-brush where they toil, 
Up from the Pennyrile's cave-pierced ground 
Comes a wild and woolly, welcome sound 
Of rattling spurs and clanking swords. 
Of mounted men in hustling hordes ; 
A thousand horsemen, ten times o'er. 
And ten times ten that many more ; 
Each eager, with a wild delight. 
To meet the Spaniards in a fight. 
Each sword is flashing from its sheath, 
And eyes are sparkling underneath ; 
Strong arms are raised, and hearts as true 
As beat beneath the gray and blue, 
And fierce the clarion voices shout : 
"We're fixed to fight this business out. 
Bring on the men the armies need. 
We'll be the Colonels. Let war proceed ! " 



AND OTHER THINGS. 45 



THE WAR-SHIP KEN 
TUC KY'S APPEAL. 

Hark ye, 

Ye naval experts ! 

Let me speak, though yet so young. 

I would not that you frame me as 

You frame my sister ships ; 

For there is that 

In my great name demanding change. 

Launch me, 

When I am launched. 

In water that is salt, 

For water that is fresh 

Kentucky disesteems. 

Let all the decks 

Which cover me 

Be cold, 

For those are they 

Kentucky loves ; 

No turrets place about my form 

Armed with those rifled guns, 



46 YAWPS 

But let hip-pockets take their place, 

With Colt's revolvers stuck therein ; 

Keep sea grass from my hull 

When I'm afloat, 

For Blue Grass 

Is Kentucky's pride, 

And that she floats in 

To her chin. 

No donkey engines run on me, 

For I am used to thoroughbreds, 

And when they run 

Kentucky's glad, 

When I am flao^Sfed 

Give me three stacks 

Of Red and White and Blue, 

And let me fly them at the fore 

And victory is mine. 

These are Kentucky's colors. 

And by them 

United will she stand. 

Now, hark ye, experts ! 

This or nought : 

When you do christen me 

" Kentucky," sirs, let 

No champagne be used. 

Nor other deadly drug, 

Nor fatuous and vapid stuff; 



AND OTHER THINGS. 47 

But christen me 

With juice of corn 

In ancient, unctuous, amber gold ; 

Old Bourbon Whiskey, sirs, 

So mellow in its age, 

So fragrant in perfume, 

So smooth in liquid grace 

That patriots would weep 

To lose a drop 

In any but this sacred cause. 

Thus will the name you give me fit; 

And for that name 

I'll make a record on the seas 

Not less than now it is 

Upon the land ! 



48 YAWPS 



THE PRINCE OF WALES 
HAS A COLD. 

Copenhagen, April 14. — The Prince of Wales is suffering from a 
cold and slight catarrh of the larynx. 

Good bordig, Pridce, 

We're dard sorry to leard 

Of your iddispositiod. 

There's dothig, 

Id our opidiod, so disagreeable 

As a code id the head. 

Whad are you doig for id ? 

We've god a rebedy 

Thad is the besd 

Od earth, 

Bar dud. 

We dever heard of id's 

Failig to kdock the stuffig 

Oud of a code, 

Do batter how bad id was, 

Ad if you will try id, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 49 

We'll guaradtee a cure 
Or do pay. 
Jusd taig a liddle 
Bolasses ad odiods 
Ad bix theb id — 
However, 
You bust be bored 
Full of holes 
By kide frieds 
With code rebedies 
By this tibe, 
Ad we'll berely 
Exsted our sybathies. 
So log, ode chap. 
Good bordig — 
Bud hadd't you better try- 
However, 
Good bordig. 



4 — Yawps. 



so 



YAWPS 



A HINT OF SPRING. 

There's a lazy time a-comin' 
And it's comin' purty soon ; 

It'll git a start in April 

And'll keep it up through June. 

The sun'U come a-streakin' 

Crosst the valleys and the hills, 

With its warmin' litrht a-drivin' 
Out the shivers and the chills. 

It'll loaf around the gardens 
And'll roost among the trees, 

A-coaxin' and persuadin' 

With a mighty power to please; 

Till the earth will be in color, 
With the roses all in bloom 

And the trees in leaf, and Nater 
Injoyin' of the boom. 

It'll ketch a feller workin' 

In the house er out of doors, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 51 

And'll start the tired feelin' 
Oozin' out of all his pores. 

It'll make his eyelids heavy, 

It'll set his brain on dreams 
Of the cool and shady places 

By the quiet runnin' streams. 

Then's the time to go a fishin', 

For the lazy time is best, 
'Cause a fish ain't hardly human, 

And it never wants to rest. 

By the ripplin' of the waters, 

Makin' music all the day, 
He can stretch out where its shady 

And jest fish his life away. 

It's the sunshine time, the fishin' time, 

The lazy time that's best. 
When a feller don't want nothin* 

But to soak his soul in rest. 



52 YAWPS 



AN EASTER EGG 

I am an Egg, 

An Easter Egg. 

Behold how beautiful 

My outside is, 

In glittering gold. 

In silver sheen 

And burnished bronze ; 

In Tyrian purple 

And in vermeil dyes ; 

In rainbow hues 

Set solidly, 

Or woven intricately 

In curious, chaotic chromes ; 

In blended tints and shades 

And in all manner 

Of prismatic wonders. 

I please the eye, 

And satisfy the sense 

Of harmony in all the airs, 

That light may play 



AND OTHER THINGS. 53 

Upon the chords of taste ; 

I fill the tired 

^Esthetic soul 

With that chromatic rest 

Which quiet sunsets 

Bring in June 

To bathe a twilight world 

In crimson peace ; 

Or yet again, 

I stir the limner's brush 

To nobler victories 

In realms of light. 

That's how I am outside 

My shell ; 

Within, 

I may be a bad egg, 

Through and through ; 

A doubly whited sepulchre, 

In that, all colors blended 

Are but white. 

That's me, 

A gaudy glory to the eye 

At every Easter show, 

But— 

There are others ! 



54 YAWPS 



THE DAY OF HATS. 

Oh, Easter Morn, 

Oh, Day Easterious ! 

Ten million bonnets rise 

Upon the sight 

And fill the time 

With frenzied light 

From myriad prism' d ribbons, 

And with flowers 

As odorless as rainbows are, 

And with ten times 

The rainbow's hues. 

In blended shades and tints, 

And fluffier in their feathere<l plumes 

Than nodding palms 

Upon a thousand tropic plains. 

And gowns galore ! 

Such gowns, gadzooks. 

As, if the angels wore, 

High Heaven would be 

So different a place. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 55 

Polychromatic Infinity! 
All feminine 
In loveliness, save this, 
A man at intervals 
In Easter pants ! 
Stone gray, perhaps, 
Or mauve, 
Or yet anon. 
Of lavender, 
Or some poetic tint 
Too sweet for other use 
Than Easter pants. 
Oh, Easter Morn ! 
Oh, Day Easterious ! 
In silken glimmer. 
Satin sheen, 
And lace illumed, 
In pure white light 
You are in very truth 
The Prism of the Spring. 



S6 YAWPS 



PARKS AND SPRING 

One sees 

The trees 

Are greening in the parks ; 

And larks 

(There are no larks 

But there's no time 

To hunt a better rhyme) 

And other birds, 

In flocks and herds, 

Are filling all the days 

And ways 

With merry lays, 

Both song and egg. 

The lively squirrels 

Shake out their tails, 

Like fuzzy sails, 

And fly 

Treeward to the sky ; 

Or linger 'long the grass 

To grab a peanut as you pass ; 



AND OTHER THINGS. 57 

And little girls, 

As dainty as the flowers, 

And boisterous boys, 

Whose youthful powers 

Seem gone entirely to noise, 

Run everywhere 

And fill themselves with air, 

As fresh and good 

As blows in any forest wood. 

And cops. 

In bright blue togs, 

By skips and hops 

Chase unchained dogs ; 

Or on a horse, 

Go o'er the course 

To catch a runaway and save 

A wagon-load of ladies 

From an untimely grave. 

The roadways are alive 

With those who drive ; 

And thousands walk 

And talk 

Along the paths that run 

Through pleasing shade and cheering sun. 

The grass is velvet, 

Soft and green. 

And low between 

The leafy, loving trees 



58 YAWPS 

Are blooming bushes 

Bending in the breeze. 

The benches fill 

With Jack and Jill, 

With Mike and Maggie, 

Sambo, Sal, 

Katrina, Owgoost — 

And the Mall 

Is crowded to the lids 

With niggling nurses and the kids 

They have in charge. 

The fountains, 

Squirtless in the wintertime, 

Now rise 

In strings of silver 

Toward the skies ; 

Upon the lake 

The skiff and barge, 

With argosies of gay 

And gladsome youth, 

Have sway, 

And from the boats 

Lacrustine laughter floats. 

Above it all the soft sky swings 

Its light, aerial, azure wings. 

And everybody and everything 

Unite in a general 

Hurrah for spring. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 59 



FUNSTON OF KANSAS. 

Gee whiz, 

What a fighter Funston is ! 

Funston of Kansas ; he 

Who, over yonder across the sea, 

Out Philippine way, 

Three times a day. 

Grabs a gun 

And starts the rebs on a run; 

And he'll fight 

At night; 

Or morning or evening or noon, 

Or December or June, 

Or any old time ; he 

Lives on fighting. See ? 

Eats it, sleeps with it, drinks it, 

Thinks it, 

But never talks it; just does it! 

Whoop — 

And he's got a scoop 

On the foe. 



6o YAWPS 

He doesn't know 

What it is not to go 

After a reb when one's in sight, 

Day or night. 

And he'll swim a river 

Without a shiver, 

Through a volley of shot 

That will make the water hot ! 

He's always in front, where 

The circumambient air 

Is chuck full of lead, 

But he keeps his head, 

And in a minute or two 

He's beating a hullabaloo 

On the rebs' coat-tails. 

He never fails, 

And he doesn't know 

What it is to go slow. 

Of all the fighters, trained or raw, 

Funston's the fightin'est they ever saw 

Out in the Philippines, and 

He's keeping right at it, hand over hand. 

Kansas has her weaknesses ; she may 

Want to make currency out of hay, 

And may think a gold dollar or two 

Is a regular i6 to i hoodoo, 

And she may grow whiskers on Populists' chins, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 6x 

But Funston covers a multitude of sins. 

Funston of Kansas, him 

That's a dandy Jim 

In all kinds of scraps 

With the Malay yaps ; 

Funston of Kansas, let the cheers 

Of the present and all of the future years 

Be given for him ; let his name 

Be high in the soldiers' Temple of Fame ; 

Funston of Kansas ; he is great, 

The glory and pride of the Sunflower State. 



62 YAWPS 



A GOOD WOMAN 

Busy at her work all day, 
Never asks a cent of pay, 
Thinks it ought to be that way : 

Thank the Lord for Susan ! 

Singin', when she wants to sing, 
Like the robins in the spring ; 
Scoldin' some, like everything : 

Thank the Lord for Susan ! 

Always ready, day or night ; 
Always willin' — she's a sight, 
When it comes to doin' right : 

Thank the Lord for Susan ! 

Me and seven childern's what 
She looks after, well or not, 
And she's "Mother" to the lot: 

Thank the Lord for Susan ! 

Goes to church on Sundays, too, 
'Long with all she's got to do; 



AND OTHER THINGS. 63 

It's her that's goin' to pull me through : 
Thank the Lord for Susan ! 

In her hair is streaks of gray, 
And the crows' feet's come to stay ; 
But I like her best that way : 

Thank the Lord for Susan ! 

Made of consecrated clay, 
She gits better every day : 

Thank the Lord for Susan! 



64 YAWPS 



THE -BROTHER TO THE OX." 

[Suggested by Markham's Famous Poem of •' The Man With the Hoe."] 

Say, Brother to the Ox, stand up, 

And tell the Poet who 
Thus calls you names to go to Aitch, 

And do it p d q. 

Your leaning on the hoe is rot; 

You haven't got a hoe; 
You've got a cultivator which 

Has steam to make it go. 

The emptiness of ages that 

He tells you he can see 
Spread on your face is honest sweat 

And soil of high degree. 

You're dead to rapture and despair, 

You neither hope nor grieve, 
He sadly says, and what he says 

Nobody will believe. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 65 

For when your wide and waving fields 

Are rich with wheat and corn, 
No happier man than you are then 

Has ever yet been born. 

And what a rapture when you swap 

A balky horse and get 
A crackajack of pedigree 

On which it's safe to bet ! 

And when you take up politics, 

Although you make a muss 
Sometimes, you never cease to hope 

You'll slay the Octopus. 

Who loosened and let down your jaw? 

Lord knows. Whoe'er he is. 
You've tackled him in splendid style 

And long ago smashed his. 

"Whose was the hand," the Poet cries, 
That slanted back your brow? 

And you can tell him, if it was, 
It isn't that way now. 

Whose breath blew out the light within 

Your brain? he also asks. 
As though he had a contract to 

Perform a thousand tasks. 

5 — Yawps, 



66 YAWPS 

It was an old-time tallow-dip, 

To blow out which was right, 
And in the place of it you've got 

A new electric light. 

Say, Brother to the Ox, you're great; 

And hoes and ploughs and things. 
Like those in last year's bird's-nest style, 

Of which the Poet sings 

Are not your kind. You're up to snuff; 

You've got the latest fads ; 
And when it comes to showing down, 

By Zucks! you've got the scads. 

You wear good clothes; you've got a house 

Built on the modern plan, 
And when your wife and daughters drive, 

They go behind a span. 

In reference to your brotherhood. 

Whatever may be said, 
Your herd-book shows conclusively 

The Ox is thoroughbred. 

You read the papers day by day. 

And take the magazines ; 
You wear a dress-suit with the ease 

You wear your working jeans. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 67 

And when the Poet writes a verse 

That shows you as a lout 
You buy a copy of his book 

To help the Poet out. 

Say, Brother to the Ox, you're fine; 

You do just as you please, 
And like a slugger swat the si — 

Lence of the centuries. 

Oh, masters, lords and rulers in 
All lands and bonds and stocks, 

You bet you are not in it with 
This Brother to the Ox. 



68 YAWPS 



THE LOVE OF WOMAN. 

Does woman have a head 

To love with, 

Or 

To think with ? 

Is she compelled to calculate 

A why and wherefore 

For her love, 

And demonstrate it 

By a rule, 

As one sets figures thus and so 

To reach results ? 

Why has she heart, 

If it is not 

To lead her soul 

Through gentler ways than reason's are? 

A heart-throb is to her 

As measureless as Heaven, 

And why should she 

Let finite thought 

Essay to put a limit on 



AND OTHER THINGS. 69 

The infinite? 

Her head she thinks with ; 

*Tis with her heart that she forgets ; 

And in forgetfulness there is 

That love that makes 

A woman what she is : 

God's dearest gift to all the world ! 



YAWPS 



MEMORIAL DAY, 1900. 

Now comes 

The roll of drums 

That tell the story of 

The glory of 

The patriot dead 

Whose blood was shed 

On land and sea 

To make our country free 

And give its liberty 

To weak and helpless others 

Held in bond as we, 

In other times, were. 

It was not theirs to live to see 

The glorious fruits of victory. 

But every grave 

Of every brave 

And o-enerous son 

Whose work is done. 

Is dearer now to us 

Than was his life to him, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 71 

And where he sleeps 

There love its vigil keeps. 

In the Northland where the snow is, 

In the Southland where the sun is, 

On the green Atlantic meadows, 

By the murmurous Pacific, 

In the arid land of Indians, 

On the banks of Mississippi, 

By the waters of Lake Erie, 

Underneath the Cuban palm trees. 

By the roads of Porto Rico, 

In the swamps and by the rivers 

Of the far-off Orient Islands, 

Are our glory spots. 

The silent stars 

That shine upward 

To light the path 

Where patriot sons 

Shall tread 

Beneath those other stars 

That glitter in the Flag. 

Upon the soldiers' 

Everlasting camping ground 

We strew the flowers of summer time. 

Our messengers of light 

And warmth and love, 

Remembering, 



72 YAWPS 

To those who, after "Taps," 

Have sunk to rest 

To wait the reveille 

That wakes a world. 

We bring 

The fragrant roses of the North, 

The fair magnolias of the South, 

The sweet forget-me-nots 

Of all this land of ours 

Made free and fertile 

By the blood of those 

Who loved it so 

They gave their lives for it. 

We give them tears, 

And though our eyes be wet 

There is that in our hearts 

That makes tears glad 

For heroes, dead in noble sacrifice, 

Are greater gain 

Than any loss. 

To-day swing out the Starry Flag, 

Let no more tears be shed, 

The loving living glory in 

The glory of the dead. 

Swing out the Flag ! 

And roll the drums, 

A Nation with its homage 

Comes. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 73 



THE PROSE OF POETRY 

His poem had been writ 

And brought him gold. 

Filled full of lofty thought, 

Of noble purpose and 

Of brilliant wit, 

Of sentiment and soul ; 

Of music, unattuned, 

It turned the mystic key 

That fits the lock of wealth. 

It was a picture 

Wrought in words ; 

A star plucked from 

The sky of mind ; 

A white rose from 

The garden of the heart. 

And yet it was not these 

To him. 

Between its splendid lines 

He found a suit of clothes ; 

Its periods rounded out to him 



74 YAWPS 

A plate of soup, 

A roast of beef, 

A piece of pie. 

Its rhythmic flowing feet 

Wore shoes for him ; 

Its soul 

Went to his stomach, 

And its sentiment 

Gave him a bed on which to sleep 

And dream the poet's dream; 

Its measure and its melody, 

Its waking and its wretchedness. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 75 



THE SWEET GIRL GRADUATE, 

See there she stands 

In gown of white — 

All white and fluffy, 

Perhaps a little puffy — 

And in her hands 

A roll 

Of manuscript; a scroll, 

Tied with a pale pink ribbon, 

Or ethereal blue. 

Mayhap a rose 

Is at her dainty waist ; 

Mayhap a sash 

Of some cool tint 

Encircles it 

And spreads into a bow 

With streamers falling to her hem. 

Her hair lies soft 

Upon her classic head 

And touches with caressing curls 



76 YAWPS 

Her fair, 

Smooth brow, 

Unwrinkled now 

With care. 

A ribbon-knot adorns it. 

Or a bloom 

As sweet as she is. 

Her face, ahg-ht 

With promise and with hope, 

Is radiant as a star, 

And through her cheeks 

The young blood courses ruddily. 

The future glistens in her eyes, 

And out beyond 

The narrow confines 

Of her Past and Now, 

She sees a dream, 

All golden glorious, 

Coming- true. 

Her heart beats high, 

And every nerve is tense; 

While in her brain 

Are whirling thoughts 

That will not rest, 

She feels the breaking of the ties 

That held what was and what will be, 

And little tears come to her eyes 



AND OTHER THINGS. 77 

To let themselves be chased away 

By smiles. 

The bud of womanhood 

Is bursting- in her soul 

To blossom afterwhiles, 

And every parting fibre brings 

To her a thrill 

Of pleasure and of pain, 

The place grows still ; 

Her trembling fmgers hold 

Her manuscript, and in a voice, 

Half certainty, half doubt, 

Half tears, half smiles, 

She reads: 

"Standing with reluctant feet, 
Where the brooks and rivers meet. 
We have met this rare June day 
To bid farewell, ere we go away. 

"How sad it is for us who're here, 
Friends and pupils and teachers dear. 
To say good-by, perhaps, forever, 
And be engulfed in life's wide river. 

"To-day we're children ; only girls. 
Wearing our pretty frocks and golden 

curls, 
But when to-morrow's sun we see. 
Dear classmates, we shall women be. 



78 YAWPS 

"Oh think of that, dear girls. How deep 
The feeling is should make us weep ; 
For grave responsibilities must come 
To all of us, and more to some. 

"We look back now upon the years 
We've passed in school, and though 

our tears 
Did sometimes flow, all that is past, 
And we have reached the goal at last. 

"This bright Commencement Day 
we're here 
To gratefully thank our teachers dear 
And tell them how much we appreciate 
Their noble efforts, early and late. 

"No more we'll hear the chapel bell, 
No more our little fibbies tell. 
No more will we late lunches eat, 
No more we'll flirt upon the street. 

"All that is past, we know 'twas wrong, 
But like a discord in a song. 
It is forgotten in the sweeter part 
That always touches the truest heart. 

"To you, dear classmates, let me say 
One little word upon this Day ; 
Though many, many I could tell, 
But I will only say Farewell. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 79 

"A word that hath been, and must be, 
Sad and yet joyful to you and to me ; 
Sad that we must part ; and yet 
Joyful in that we will not forget. 

"And now to all, Farewell again, 
The saddest word of tongue or pen ; 
Farewell, dear friends, we part in love; 
May we meet forever in the land 
above." 



These are her burning thoughts, 

This the way 

She points to 

On Commencement Day, 

A sweet, poetic pathway 

Leading through 

A field of roses and — 

Of rue. 

My word, 

Isn't the sweet girl graduate 

A bird? 



8o YAWPS 



LO, THE SUMMER GIRL. 

Lo, there she stands 

Upon the mystic, misty line 

That lies half-way 

Between the frost and flowers ; 

Her pink cheeks redden in the sun 

And with a greeting, smile and nod, 

She comes to earth upon a bluebird's wing 

And tip-toes into June 

On rosebuds blushing sweet 

Beneath her dainty tread. 

Gowned in a garniture of filmy white 

Or fluffy pinks and blues 

And every varying tint and shade 

Of blossom-time, 

She skims above the green earth's breast 

just high enough to reach men's hearts ; 

She makes the world her own, 

And man her slave, 

And as a Queen she reigns 

Upon her hammock throne, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 8i 

Or sits in state upon a hotel porch 

Surrounded by her court ; 

The ribbons of her sailor hat 

Are rainbow-tinted fetters 

Binding close the glad, unhappy subjects 

Of her sway ; 

Her tinsel parasol 

Is sceptred in her hands 

And from its shade she rules 

A retinue of swains ; 

Down by the sea 

She walks the silver strand, 

Where emerald waves break into foamy white 

And lay their broken bodies at her feet ; 

She murmurs nothings to a hundred ears 

And gives her smiles to honeyed tongues 

That tell of manly hearts in thrall to her; 

The lazy, lambent moon 

Lies crescent in the sky 

For her to hang her witcheries on, 

And all the little stars. 

With twinkling eyes that sparkle in the blue, 

Laugh silently to see 

This sorceress of the summer-time 

Work moonshine into mystic spells ; 

The sunshine drops its dazzle 

In her hair, her eyes, her smile ; 

6 — Yawps. 



82 YAWPS 

The flowers fold their fragrance round her 

As she moves ; 

The roses lay their leaves upon her cheeks, 

The lilies on her hands, 

And everything in sight is hers. 

She leaves the land 

To meet the cool caresses of the sea, 

And Neptune sets a short-robed Queen 

Upon his billowy throne ; 

The saucy waves come up to kiss her cheeks 

And slip away, as laughingly she dares 

Them do their worst ; 

Sunburned she stands upon the shore 

And, gazing outward o'er the blue, she weeps 

For other worlds to claim as hers. 

Up from the sea 

To where the mountains touch the sky 

And bathe their dark green brows 

In silver clouds, 

She takes her way, 

All-conquering as she comes ; 

The waving trees 

Bend down their sheltering boughs 

To touch her passing underneath ; 

The gray crags soften 

When she rests on them ; 

The murmurous hum of forest life 



AND OTHER THINGS. 83 

Grows still to hear her speak, 

And what she says to any him 

Who worships her 

In those primeval shrines 

Is hidden in the hearts of flowers 

Where bees may come to gather it 

And lock it in their hives. 

She rules the mountains 

As she rules the shore, 

A flirting phantom. 

Frivolous and fair ; 

A dream of fluffy pink and white 

That ne'er comes true ; 

A bright intangibility ; 

A fantasy of music, moonlight, love and flowers, 

A Summer Girl. 



YAWPS 



THE SHIRT WAIST. 

Behold me, 

I am the Shirt Waist, 

The universal slip 

That woman wears 

And revels in 

With wild, abandoned joy, 

As unrestrained 

As I am. 

Had Eve but had 

A shirt waist on, 

When she passed outward through 

The garden gate. 

Her hardship would have seemed 

A holiday ; 

Had Cleopatra had me on 

When she swept down the Nile 

'Neath silken sails, 

She would have cast 

Her sunshades far 

Out on the rolling tide ; 



AND OTHER THINGS. 85 

And Venus, she of Medici, 

If decked in me, 

Would surely 

A new woman be. 

Without me, 

Woman's wear is but a name 

For fetters and for bonds. 

I have all season's for my own, 

But in the summer time 

I burst into ten thousand hues 

That make the rainbow pale 

And beg the sun to shine 

No more upon the rain. 

I weave 

The purple shadows of the eve 

Into my web ; 

The rose-tint and the cherry-ripe, 

The apple-bloom. 

The violet and the golden-rod, 

The chrome chrysanthemum, 

The dazzling dahlia and the tulip show, 

The painted pansy 

In a thousand dyes, 

The vari-verdancy of grasses in the fields, 

The crimson, gold and scarlet of 

The frost-kissed forest leaves. 

The multi-colored breadth of earth 



86 YAWPS 

And sea and sky and air, 

And lambent moon and silver sun, 

And topaz stars 

Are not arrayed like rtiost of me, 

When Summer comes to let 

My gorgeous glories loose 

And spread them o'er the world. 

I fit all sizes, 

And I gather in 

The female form divine, 

From Greenland's icy mountains 

To India's coral strand, 

And no one says me nay. 

The fickle Goddess Fashion 

Flits 

To parts unknown 

When I appear, 

For I have come to stay. 

I, the Shirt Waist ; 

I, the one fixed fashion 

Of the fair. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 87 



THE HUMIDITY. 

Say Humidity, 

You pestiferous permeator 

Of an otherwise fairly respectable 

Circumambient atmosphere, 

What excuse for being 

Have you got anyway ? 

Why don't you 

Go in out of the wet ? 

Did you ever have to hit 

Anybody with a club 

For insisting on you 

To remain over 

And load the air 

Full of yourself 

Every time the 

Barometrical area 

Humped itself a bit ? 

Get out, Humidity, 

You are the very worst 

In the whole category 



88 YAWPS 

Of meteorological ills, 

And you haven't got 

A friend 

On earth. 

You're a blamed sight meaner 

Than any mean temperature 

In these parts 

For while that 

Bangs around from 

50 below to 1 50 above, 

More or less, 

You can't get above, 

A hundred 

Without being drowned out, 

And you simply 

Can't go to zero 

At all. 

But confound you, 

You can mix yourself up 

With the atmosphere, 

And then what you are 

Is a plenty. 

Oh, it's more than a plenty. 

You gosh-darned 

Draggly, 

Discouraging, 

Detestable dampness ; 



AND OTHER THINGS. 89 

You moist, 

Moppy, 

Muggy, 

Miserable mixture 

Of seven kinds of sweat 

All warranted not to dry 

Inside of a week ; 

Oh you — you — 

You make everybody tired. 

You are the father 

And mother 

And grandparents 

And mother-in-law 

Of that tired feeling 

All the world 

Has to take medicine for. 

Why, Humidity, 

You dampener of all ardour, 

Too much of you 

In good liquor 

Will even spoil that. 

Oh say, 

Can't you dry up once ? 

What this suffering sphere needs 

Is a reliable article 

Of dessicated humidity, 

And it's up to you 



YAWPS 
90 



To furnish it. 

Do you precipitate 

Our allusion? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 91 



THE ELECTRIC FAN 

Oh, yes, 

I've got a cold, 

A summer cold, 

The meanest of its race, 

The black sheep 

Of the flock of lesser ills. 

How did I get it ? 

Please ask me something hard ; 

I got it 

Sitting underneath a fan. 

Not fan of palm. 

Or feathered finery. 

Or handiwork of Jap, 

Swayed lazily 

By some fair lady's hand, 

But fan of brass. 

Sent whirlingly through space 

At lightning speed 



92 YAWPS 

By lightning spark ; 

The popular electric fan, 

The tempter 

Of an overheated man, 

The terror 

Of the summer time. 

Unto its cool caresses; I, 

Unthinking, gave myself, 

And sinking at its base 

Into an easy chair, 

I let the music 

Of its soothing whirr 

Lull me to sleep. 

Methought I floated on the wings 

Of angels fresh from Shadyland 

That fanned me as they flew 

And turned the perspiration 

On my burning brow 

To pearls of pleasantness ; 

I dreamed of babblingf brooks 

That told of spring ; 

Of purling rills 

That sang of shade ; 

Of sweet, sequestered woods, 

Unscorched by sun; 

Of fair, green fields, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 93 

Dew-kissed from morn to night; 

Of rose bloom 

And of rhapsodies — 

And then the vision changed 

And I beheld 

A hideous horror, 

Brazen winged, 

That flew forever. 

Whirling round 

And round and round, 

Unceasingly around. 

And beat upon its cage of wire; 

The meanwhile 

Whirring wickedly 

And blowing out its icy breath 

Upon my neck 

And down my back 

Into the very marrow of my soul. 

Chilled through 

And stiffened to the bone, 

My clothes, as cold and clammy 

As the hand of death, 

Stuck to my shivering skin, 

I, with a sneeze 

And wheeze and snort, 

Awoke. 



94 YAWPS 



Oh, yes, 

I've got a code, 

A dab bad code, 

Ad I know how I god id. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 95 



AN ENIGMA. 

And the man stood before me talking : 

"Verily, verily," were his words, 

"I have been by the smooth road, 

The great road 

Where the wheels are whirling hither and yon ; 

Where the flowers bloom not. 

Yet there are many bloomers ; 

Where there are no trees, 

Yet limbs are everywhere; 

Where no cattle come, 

Yet calves are many ; 

Lean calves and fat. 

Pretty calves and homely. 

Old calves and young ; 

And stranger than the other strange things 

Was this : 

That no calf of all those calves 

Had more than one leg !" 

Then the man ceased speaking, 

And I communed with myself, saying : 

" Verily, the wheels this man thought he saw 

Are in his own head." 

And I plumed myself upon my superior wisdom. 



96 YAWPS 



THE SHIR T-W A I S T MAN. 

Behold me, 

Coatless and cool ; 

I am the Shirt Waist Man 

And if I don't 

Take the rag off the bush, 

I take the coat 

Off my back 

And fling it 

In the face of conventionality. 

What do I care 

If Fashion 

Piles the perspiration 

Chin deep 

On the backs 

Of coated men ? 

It doesn't monkey with me, 

For I yank off my coat 

And Fashion 

Chases itself out of my 

Neighborhood, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 97 

And leaves me 

Cool 

As a cucumber. 

Of course, 

My shirt waist 

Isn't cut according 

To the pattern 

Of the lady shirt waist, 

And it lacks 

Fluff and puff 

And furbelow, 

And has a 

Superfluity of narrative, 

Perhaps, 

But it gets there 

Just the same, 

And I am comfortable, 

While those. 

Coated with conventionality. 

Sweat and swear 

And kick holes 

In the Weather Bureau 

And lose their tempers 

In an overflow of temperature. 

The Shirt Waist Man 

Isn't a recognized institution 

Just yet, 

7 — Yawps. 



98 YAWPS 

But he's the coming man, 

And the hot weather 

Brings him out 

As it does the tassels 

On a field of corn, 

And soon the streets 

Will blossom with him, 

Not altogether 

A thing of beauty, 

But verily a joy 

To himself 

During the heated term. 

That's me, 

The Shirt Waist Man, 

And as long 

As I keep cool 

Conventionality 

May go to thunder. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 99 



LARCHMONT'S SHIRT- 
WAIST HOP. 

At a recent shirt-waist hop at fashionable Larchmont on Long 
Island Sound, two hundred representative garments were present. 

Larchmont had a shirt-waist hop 

And all the men were there, 
The grave brunette, the giddy blonde, 

The bravest and the fair. 

There were blue shirt waists 

And red shirt waists 

And pink shirt waists and green, 

There were white shirt waists 

And black shirt waists 

And fat shirts waists and lean. 

There were dark shirt waists 
And light shirt waists 
And gray shirt waists and blue. 
There were smooth shirt waists 
And ruffled shirt waists 
And false shirt waists and true. 
Lof L. 



loo YAWPS 

There were mauve shirt waists 

And yellow shirt waists 

And right shirt waists and wrong, 

There were pretty shirt waists 

And ugly shirt waists 

And short shirt waists and long. 

There were plaited shirt waists 

And netted shirt waists 

And paid-for shirt waists and not, 

There were hiofh shirt waists 

And low shirt waists 

And cool shirt waists and hot. 

There were nice shirt waists 
And cheap shirt waists, 
They were all shirt waists in style ; 
There were plain shirt waists 
There were quiet shirt waists 
And some you could hear a mile. 

There was every kind of a shirt waist there, 
With a man to match it inside, 

And the girls were so jealous 
Of the shirt-waisted fellows 
That they sat on the floor and cried : 

Or somebody has lied. 



AND OTHER THINGS. loi 



THE AUTOMOBILE. 

I am the Automobile 

And I run 

My never tiring course 

Along the roadways 

Of the world, 

And leave no hoofprints 

In the sands of time. 

I am the horse's Juggernaut, 

Likewise the mule's, 

And over their recumbent necks 

My whirHng wheels 

Pass to an era 

Not for them. 

They mark a step in progress 

Through six thousand years ; 

I leap the bounds 

Of all the past 

And whizz into the future with 

A swish that marks me here 

This instant, and the next 

A thousand years ahead. 

I stand, a pioneer, 

Upon the lofty ridge 

Between the new and old, 



YAWPS 



And backward down the Kismet path 

I hear the slow surceasing tread 

Of hoof-beats moving to the field 

Of desuetude, 

I look before and see 

A million multiples of me 

Subservinor man 

o 

In all his moving needs, 

A ministrant of motion that 

Is measureless as are 

Its master's wants. 

By night and day I stand and wait, 

And at the master's beck 

I go. 

I have no tired eyelids for 

The hand of Sleep 

To lay its fingers on ; 

No hunger gnaws my vitals out ; 

No muscles, overstrained and sore, 

Plead silently to me for rest. 

In my new lexicon 

There's no such word as rest; 

And tireless as may be 

The energies of man. 

My service meets them everywhere, 

As tireless as they, 

And makes cessation cowardice, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 103 

I am the movement 

Of the time to come ; 

And in me motion finds 

Its rhythm and its poesy, 

Its " get there" \ 

And its best activity, 

I am The Thing ; 

The It of passage and 

The master servant of the master man. 

Through the splendors of the future, 

In every land and clime, 

I will lead the grand procession 

Up the corridors of time. 

In the niche of transportation 

In the Pantheon of Fame, 

God among the gods of motion, 

I shall set my seal and name. 



I04 YAWPS 



MAUD MILLER. 

Maud Miller in the summer's heat, 
Raked the meadows thick with wheat. 

The Judge rode slowly down the lane, 
Soothing his horse's chestnut mane. 

"With wheat at a dollar per," said he, 
"This maid is about the size for me." 

Then he smiled at her and she blushed at him. 
And over the meadow fence he dim. 

"Will you marry me, sweet maid," he said. 
And she told him yes, and they were wed. 

Alas for maiden, alas for Judge, 

For old designer and wheatfield drudge. 

Lord pity them both and pity us all. 
For Maud didn't own the wheat at all. 

And the Judge remarked when he learned the 

cheat : 
"Don't talk to me about dollar wheat!" 



AND OTHER THINGS. loc 



READ Y— I F NEEDED! 

Up on the coasts and hills of Maine, 
Where the spruce gum is a source of gain. 
Where the ice crops in the rivers grow. 
And the pine woods' splendors hide in snow ; 
Every man is ready ! 

Down in the solemn Everglades, 
In the orange orchards' pleasant shades, 
By the rivers, still and dark and deep, 
Where the lazy alligators sleep ; 
Every man is ready ! 

Off in the Texas cotton fields. 
Where the earth her snowy fibre yields, 
Where the plains stretch out and far away 
From the dawn to the going down of day ; 
Every man is ready ! 

There in the big, strong Keystone State, 
Whose brawn and muscle have made her great, 
Where the sturdy miner and mill hand give 
To Labor the heart that makes it live ; 
Every man is ready ! 



To6 YAWPS 

Out in the blizzardous, cold Northwest, 
V/here the zero weather will stand the test, 
Where the tops of the mountains scrape the skies, 
And the wheat fields yield their golden prize ; 
Every man is ready ! 

Out on the California strand, 
Where the sun shines soft on a Promised Land, 
Where the roses bloom and the hillsides laugh, 
\\ ith the fruit whose blood the gods may quaff ; 
Every man is ready! 

Still on, to the Puget country where 
The mountains loom through the misty air. 
Where the great primeval forests stand 
As sentinels who guard the land ; 
Every man is ready! 

Up in the fields where the daisies bloom, 
Down in the city's dingiest room. 
Out on the plains, or in the hills. 
Deep in the mines, or in the mills, 
From everywhere they're rising, then. 
Ten thousand regiments of men ; 

And every man is ready. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 107 



HYMEN'S SPEECH. 

Behold me, 

Hymen, the Hustler, 

And Hitcher of Hearts. 

Ever since Easter 

I've been working overtime 

And we're not half way in sight 

Of June, when the real rush 

Of roses and rapture 

Is turned on full. 

Still I'm not going to strike 

For shorter hours. 

My advance agent 

And business solicitor, 

Cupid, 

Has been a busy little god 

All winter, 

And I've got to hustle 

To keep up with his orders. 

I'm the boss coupler 

Of two souls with but a single thought, 



io8 YAWPS 

And the way I can hook up 

Two hearts that beat as one 

Is a sight to behold. 

I'm the best friend 

And the most profitable partner 

Of the florist, 

The caterer, 

The preacher, 

The milliner, 

The dressmaker, 

The furniture dealer, 

The real estate agent 

And the instalment-plan man ; 

But do I get any of the rake-off? 

Nary a nickel. 

I ought to kick, I suppose. 

But I don't. 

My clients are all 

So perfectly happy. 

So ineffably blissful. 

So supremely ecstatic. 

And so infinitely pleased 

That I take it out in that. 

And forget the gross, material profits 

Which others get out of the business 

Of hymenizing, 

I've had a rush like this 



AND OTHER THINGS. 109 

Every Spring since I began operations, 

But I never get tired 

And the more I have to do 

The better I like it. 

Plenty of kicks are coming, 

Of course, 

But that's not my affair. 

I give no guarantees, 

And if people don't find goods 

To be as represented, 

It's no mix of mine 

However, this is my busy day, 

And there are forty-seven calls for me 

This very minute. 

Anything I can do for you ? 

No? 

Sorry. 

So long ; 

See you later. 



YAWPS 



CONCERNING A DAY. 

If you're asking what the row is, 
What the never-ceasing noise is, 
What the bursting boundless boom is, 
What the blunderbussian bang is, 
What the flushing fiery fizz is. 
What the whooping, whanging whiz is. 
What the swinging, sweeping sizz is. 
What the silence-spHtting sound is. 
What the too terrific toot is. 
What the boisterous, breezy blare is, 
What the brassy, big-horn blast is. 
What the much meandering march is. 
What the flawless, flying flag is, 
Why the spruce gum of Katahdin 
Spruces finer than a fiddle, 
Why the cold New England Yankee 
Booms the everlasting Doodle, 
Why the blooming wooden nutmeg 
Whoops itself to something greater, 
Why the knightly Knickerbocker 
Knicks his bocks and bocks his knicker, 
Why the mint of old Virginia 



AND OTHER THINGS. „, 

Coins a patriotic julep, 
Why the Georgia watermelon 
Bursts in red enthusiasm. 
Why the tents that tickle Tampa 
Swell with pride and tooting troopers, 
Why the old Kentucky Bourbon 
Turns its yeller into gladness, 
Why the Texas cotton raiser 
Raises other things than cotton, 
Why from Maine to California, 
On to Oregon or Klondike, 
From the Philippines to Cuba, 
Taking in the Sandwich Islands 
And some other territory. 
There is boom and bang and bolster. 
There is fizz and fire and fervor, 

There is Yankee Doodle-Dixie 

Uncle Sam will tell you briefly 
That he's out to do some Fourthing. 
Just a bit of Fourthing, mind you, 
On his jolly July birthday ; 
That he's out to have a pleasant 
Little Uncle Sam-sam frolic ! 
That is all. Now if there's any- 
Body thinks that he can stop it. 
Say for instance, let him try it. 
Let him try it, right this minute ! 

Whoop-la ! ! 



YAWPS 



IN WASHINGTON. 

They say that in this city, 

Our fair, pale Marguerite, 
And Kate and Jane and others 

Wear anklets near their feet ; 
They say our lovely damsels, 

Who never can grow old, 
Adorn their graceful ankles 

With silver bands, or gold 

They say there are inscriptions 

Within those circling bands, 
So shy and coy that only 

A maiden understands ; 
They say these anklets carry 

A wealth of jewels rare, 
Which flash in starry sparkles, 

Mid dainty underwear. 

They say : but what is gossip ? 

An exercise of spite, 
In which some men are skilful, 

And women take delight. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 113 

It's gossip, merely gossip, 

Which bruits the news abroad, 
That Washington's fair damsels 

Are in this way gewgawed, 
For I have often watched them 

Pursue their pretty ways 
By primrose paths of dalliance, 

On rainy, sloppy days. 

I've seen their dainty steppings 

On crossings where the slush 
Had just about attained the 

Consistency of mush ; 
I've seen them lift their laces 

To let a stocking gleam, 
As gleams a fleeting fancy 

In some poetic dream. 

I've seen the lovely limning 

Of pictures done in silk, 
Enframed by gauzy laces 

As soft and white as milk ; 
I've caught the misty glories 

Of visions, quickly gone, 
As pink and blue auroras 

Come tripping to the dawn. 

8 — Yawps. 



114 ' YAWPS 

How many of these visions 

I've seen, I do not care 
To publish in the papers, 

But, hear me as I swear : 
The rumor is unfounded, 

Cold malice did inspire 
The statement, and I tell you 

That "They Say" is a liar. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 115 



A BLAZE OF GLORY. 

Chicago, July 3, 1894. — Mrs. Katherine O'Leary, owner of the cow 
that kicked the lamp that fired the barn that set the blaze that burned 
Chicago, died here to-day. 

Dead is Mrs. O'Leary, 

Dead in Chicago now ; 
Finished her earthly labors, 

Gone to meet her cow : 

Cow that is ever famous, 

More than heart could desire ; 

Famous because she started 
The Great Chicago Fire : 

Fire that swept the city; 

City of brick and frame 
Went up in a blaze of glory, 

That brought unfading fame : 

Fame for being the biggest 

Fire that ever blazed 
In any earthly city, 

And left the world amazed: 



ii6 YAWPS 

Amazed that from her ashes 

Chicago could arise, 
And grow with magic swiftness 

To such enormous size : 

Size that is simply wondrous ; 

Distended everywhere, 
With the wind, which is de facto, 

Coagulated air: 

Air that is filled with thickness, 

That makes the sun as red 
As the blood in her slaughter houses, 

Where the wine of her life is shed: 

Shed that her wealth and glory 

Might decorate the brow 
Of the one and only city 

Kicked to fame by a cow : 

Cow of Mrs. O'Lear)^; 

A lamp, a kick, and a shed, 
A wonderful combination 

Numbered now with the dead. 

Dead is Mrs. O'Lear}^ 

Gone to the by and by ; 
Go build her a tomb of granite 

A hundred stories high ! 



AND OTHER THINGS. ii? 



THE SPEEDWAY, NEW YORK. 

Wide 

By the waterside, 

The yellow-brown 

And rock-ribbed way leads from the town. 

Between 

The green 

Of the hills it lies 

Under the sapphire skies, 

A golden link that ties 

The stony street, 

White in the heat, 

To the cool roads that wend 

Their shady way to the end 

Of the land 

Stand. 

You, 

Where the bridges do, 

Arches of steel and arches of stone. 

Thrown 

Outward and over the way ; 



ii8 YAWPS 

And stay 

To look at the Speedway, bright 

In living color and changing light. 

Surely the sight 

Gladdens the eye, 

And sends the blood high. 

Sweeping through and through, 

Be it plain red or blue. 

See there, a horse 

On the course. 

And near him another, each 

Striving and stretching to reach 

The hill at the goal, and to win 

The glory of coming in 

In the lead — and here, there. 

Everywhere, 

Two, three, four, a dozen come 

With a whizz and a hum 

Of whirring wheels, 

And your very soul feels 

The rush of the horses, and you hear 

Cheer after cheer, 

Till your forget 

All else and let 

Your own tumultuous spirit out 

In a wild shout 

Of triumph for the winner : him, best or worst — 

No matter which — that got there first. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 119 

In the centre of the way 

The fliers stray, 

While on each side 

Of the long and wide 

Stretch of yellow-brown, 

Hundreds of others move up and down ; 

In every manner of grave and gay 

Equipage along the way, 

A rainbow of horses and wheels and wraps 

And run-a-bouts, carriages, wagons and traps. 

These in the wide : 

On the walks beside 

Are thousands on foot to see 

The whirl of the horses, and be 

Out in the open where 

The good sun shines, and the air 

Swings along fresh and free 

As sweet as the breath of the sea. 

Men, women and children, they, 

Who love the zest of the day, 

Linger along by the way, 

Glad to be where 

They find light and air 

And so much that is fair : 

Where, wide 

By the waterside 

The yellow-brown 

And rock-ribbed way leads from the town. 



I20 YAWPS 



FOR FUTURE REFERENCE. 

Say, Aguinaldo, 

You little measly 

Malay moke, 

What's the matter with you ? 

Don't you know enough 

To know 

That when you don't see 

Freedom, 

Inalienable rights. 

The American Eagle, 

The Fourth of July, 

The Star-Spangled Banner, 

And the Palladium of your Liberties, 

All you've got to do is to ask for them ? 

Are you a natural born chump 

Or did you catch it from the Spaniards? 

You ain't bigger 

Than a piece of soap 

After a day's washing, 

But, by gravy, you 



AND OTHER THINGS. 

Seem to think 

You're a bigger man 

Than Uncle Sam. 

You ought to be shrunk., 

Younof fellow ; 

And if you don't 

Demalayize yourself 

At an early date, 

And catch on 

To your golden glorious opportunities, 

Something's going to happen to you 

Like a Himalaya 

Sitting- down kerswot 

On a gnat. 

If you ain't 

A yellow dog 

You'll take in your sign 

And scatter 

Some Red, White and Blue 

Disinfectant 

Over yourself 

What you need, Aggie, 

Is civilizing. 

And goldarn 

Your yaller percoon skin, 

We'll civilize you 

Dead or alive. 



12 2 YAWPS 

You'd better 

Fall into the 

Procession of Progress 

And go marching on to glory, 

Before you fall 

Into a hole in the ground. 

Understand? 

That's us — 

U.S. 

See? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 123 



A FANTASY. 

Inspired by a slice of (New York) University Club mince pie. 

Sit down around the mystic mix, 

And lay the heaviest odds 
That nowhere else can mortals fix 

A mince pie for the gods. 

In other minces there are ills 

Whose presence perils ease, 
But everything in this mince fills 

The hungry harmonies. 

The crusts, that hold the myst'ry close, 

Melt in the mouth, and they, 
Above the earthy and the gross, 

In raptures fade away. 

The meat that's in the mince is meat 
The gods themselves must grow ; 

While grape and citron, rich and sweet. 
Are from Pomona's show. 



J 24 YAWPS 

Above the full round mystery 

Such nectarous odors rise 
That, when its gates are opened, we 

Step into Paradise. 

And one may dream who may have fed 

Upon this perfect pie. 
But all the dream paths he may tread 

Lead upward to the sky. 

Sit down around the mystic mix 

And lay the heaviest odds 
That nowhere else can mortals fix 

A mince pie for the gods. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 125 



A LAY O F THE ANCIENTS. 

Copied from the notebook of a youthful reader of the classics. 

I dreamed I wandered 'mong-st the shades 

Of those gone long ago to Hades, 

And I would fain repeat the name 

And deeds of those well known to fame. 

Chief orator in all those scenes 

I warrant was great Demosthenes, 

Who made his speeches to the throng. 

Without a stutter, all day long. 

While wiser far than all his mates, 

I'm just as sure was wise Socrates, 

Who taught here, fearless of the lip 

He got when living with Xantippe, 

And livinof still within his means 

Was economic Diogenes, 

Who, having found an honest man, 

Had swapped his lantern for a fan. 

I wandered to the ballroom floor, 

And there I saw fair Terpsichore, 

Who danced amidst a hundred maids. 

None sweeter than the sweet Pleiades; 



126 YAWPS 

And none to me were quite so nice, 

Among them all, as Eurydice. 

In that department where abides 

The court of justice, Aristides 

Was seated on a front bench high, 

And spoke to me as I passed by. 

And busy still upon his deeds 

Of science was great Archimedes. 

Beyond the limits of the schools. 

Among the athletes was Hercules, 

The strong man of the show, you bet. 

And one a fellow can't forget ; 

Alongside, dressed in steel-trimmed frills, 

I saw the warrior bold, Achilles, 

And near him weeping, in a robe 

Of sombre shape, sat sad Niobe, 

A lady who has wept so much, 

It makes one cry to think of such. 

Now wandering on, my sight reveals 

The famous sculptor Praxiteles ; 

With chisel drawn, he's making terms, 

I ween, to sculpt another Hermes. 

And thus I wandered in my dream 

And met at every turn a stream 

Of famous and illustrious shades 

Inhabiting the realm of Hades, 

Who seemed to be quite satisfied 

And showed me round the place with pride. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 127 



CHICAGO PHONETICS. 

The Senate of the University of Chicago has vetoed the action of the 
Administrative Board of the University Press in deciding to adopt for 
use in the university publications the National Educational Association's 
list of twelve words in the abbreviated phonetic spelling. — Chicago 
News Item. 

O Doctors, lernd in menny things, 

No doubt it's just az wel 
That yu ar met by others who 

Reject yore wa tu spel ; 
Perhaps tha no no more than yu ; 

Perhaps not quite az much, 
But tha ar more conservativ 

And rather keep in tuch 

With what iz old, than what iz nu, 

Because they no that what 
Iz nu and hithertu untride 

Ma posibly be not 
The proper thing ; and so tha stand 

Stif-nekt agenst yore plan 
Tu drop the old and make the nu 

Conspikuus in the van. 



128 YAWPS 

That it iz sumwhat ruf on yu, 

We must admit, but then 
Yu've got tu go a littel slo — 

The conquests ov the pen 
Ar never quick az ar the soard's 

And time alone can tel 
The triumf ov yore efforts tu 

Adopt nu waze to spel. 

But yu wil get thair, never fear ; 

It's bound tu kum, for we 
Ar forjing onward tu the frunt 

With wundrus energy. 
And when we cough, we'll cof, gadzooks ; 

And if we're toucrh, we're tuf ; 
And when we're through, we're thru; 
and then 

Enough will be enuf ; 

And phthisic will be tizzik then, 

And so wil debt be det, 
And sigh wil fal awa tu si, 

And al the rest, yu bet 
Wil take a tumbel tu themselves, 

And speling by yore act 
Will in Q-Qod time bekum tu be 

A grand fonetic fact. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 129 



IN CHRYSANTHEMUMIAM. 

Say, there, 
You rosybuds 
And lilypods, 
And sweet peas, 
And daffydowndillies, 
And daisies, 
And geraniums, 
And all you other 

Miss Nancies of the flowering world, 
, Will you please go sprinkle yourselves, 
And turn your weeping eyes on Me — 
Me, 

The effulgent and iridescent full-back 
Of the Floral Field ? 
The only blooming 
Football player 

In the whole botanical business ? 
There's nothing 
Of the modest little violet style 
In my ornate 

9 — }'aups. 



13° YAWPS 

And flocculent physiognomy, 

And when it comes 

To throwing bouquets, 

I rather fancy 

I'm a whole plate 

Of cold slaw 

Myself! 

Don't I seem 

To strike you that way? 

I am also 

A shredded sunburst of glory, 

And when I rise and shine 

There is but one light 

By which the footsteps 

Of the fleet and fading Flora 

Are guided: 

That's Me, 

The Chrysanthemum ! 

See? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 

131 



TO THE W. C. T. U. CON- 
V E N T I O N. 

(In Seattle.) 

Hail, Women ! 

Hail and welcome ! 

We are glad 

To have you 

In the wide and wondrous West, 

Where water in ten million 

Silver streams 

Flows down a million hills 

Made green and glorious 

By such wholesome drink ; 

And half the year 

The kindly clouds 

Pour their libations down 

To make the other half 

All sunshine, flowers, 

And genial glow 

Of generous earth. 

We greet you. Women, 

From all otherwheres — 



132 YAWPS 

The frigid North. 

The languorous South, 

The cultured East, 

The multifarious Middle West ; 

Wherever you may have your homes 

There better things prevail, 

And though the toddy 

Trembles to its fall, 

And cheerinor cocktails 

Dodge into a dismal 

Desuetude, 

And sparkling fizz 

Grows stale and flat 

And profitless, 

And Bacchus 

Bids his beer adieu, 

Your courage does not fail 

Nor does your purpose 

Go awry. 

The woeful, wicked Taste 

That worships wine 

And in the red 

Of crimson chalices 

Looks on the sunrise of its soul ; 

That browses dreamily 

Upon the green and tender mint ; 

That sees the stars 



AND OTHER THINGS. 133 

Of love and poesy 

In every sparkle of the yellow stream 

Which flows from France, 

Is not your kind, 

And happily is not. 

Here's to you, then, 

Just as you are, 

And let us drink your health 

And ours as well. 

And that of all mankind, 

In water, clear and cold 

And pure as are the motives 

Of your deeds. 

Hail, Women ! 

Hail and welcome ! 

Although we do not pledge 

Your health in rare old wines 

We look towards you in a light 

That everlasting shines 

And glorifies you, as no wine 

Could glorify; and now 

Here's hail and welcome once again, 

And, pardon us, "Here's how!" 



134 YAWPS 



ANOTHER COUNTY 
HEARD FROM. 

I am ready to fight if necessary. — Gen. Joe Wheeler of Alabama, 

Then up rose General Wheeler 

Of Alabama, who 
Led all the Southern horsemen 

The great rebellion through, 
And, rising, said : " I'm with you, 

You wearers of the blue. 

" In other days my color 

Was gray, and what I did 
I think was quite convincing 

That I was not a kid ; 
Now, by that selfsame token, 

I'm loaded for the Cid. 

"What's past is past forever, 

And in this better day 
We have a closer Union, 

Including blue and gray; 
A Union without section, 

Forever come to stay. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 135 

"I'm ready for the Spanish 
If they should come ashore, 

And with ten thousand horsemen 
I'd like to lead once more, 

This time a troop of Yankees, 
A rebel at the fore 

" In blue, thank God ! and floating 

Above the serried host, 
Old Glory in the glory 

Of which we love to boast : 
•One Flag, one God, one Country,' 

Our everlasting toast." 



136 YAWPS 



SOME TEXAS PECU- 
LIARITIES. 

Though Texas is a lordly State 

And loaded full of biz, 
It's not a millionth time as big 

As Texans think it is ; 
But just the same, no one would care 
To make this truthful statement there. 

Just why he wouldn't there's no need 

Of saying in this space ; 
Enough to say, that truth, though good, 

Is sometimes out of place ; 
And, notwithstanding speech is free, 
The wise man muzzles liberty. 

But Texas is a wonder State ; 

It grows horned toads and things, 
And cattle which have horns so long 

They cut them into strings ; 
And spiders with such scads of hair. 
They make a football fiend look bare. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 137 

There counties grow to such extent 

That almost any State 
Could hide within their vastness and 

Stay there and vegetate ; 
And there the plains spread out so wide 
They haven't any other side. 

Her rivers are tremendous things, 

At least so Texans state, 
Yet they must irrigate them, so 

Their boats can navigate ; 
And fish must leave the rivers' path 
And go to sea to get a bath. 

A man once said that if he had 

(At least so I've heard tell) 
A residence in Texas and 

Another one in h — , 
He wouldn't live in Texas ; yet, 
He never said it there, you bet. 



138 YAWPS 



CONSUL-GENERAL LEE'S 
REMARKS. 

The Spaniards call Fitzhugh Lee a Yankee. — Havana Despatch. 

"They say that I'm a Yankee: 

I have heard it many times, 
I have seen it in their papers, 

It is in their songs and rhymes ; 
I'm the Yankee Consul-General, 

I'm the Yankee who's come down 
To steal the brightest jewel 

From the old Castilian crown. 

"They say that I'm a Yankee : 

If I'd heard it in my youth, 
I might perhaps have questioned 

Its everlasting truth ; 
But now, I glory in it : 

It's the landmark of my birth, 
And I'd rather be a Yankee 

Than anything on earth. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 139 

"They say that I'm a Yankee, 

And I'm glad to say I am ; 
A Yankee of the Yankees, 

And the man ain't worth a — well, 
Who wouldn't be a Yankee 

When the Banner is unfurled 
That has made the Yankee Nation 

The greatest of the world ? 

"They say that I'm a Yankee. 

Virginians, can it be 
That history will mention 

The Yankee, Fitzhugh Lee? 
I hope so ; and, Virginians, 

Let all of us give thanks 
That now dear ol' Virginny 

Is loaded full of Yanks." 



X40 YAWPS 



THE PASSING OF THE 
SUMMER GIRL. 

Sit still, you throbbing heart ! 

Sit still, 

Won't you ? 

While yet the Summer Girl 

Sweeps swiftly out of sight ! 

Not that she's not 

Out of sight. 

Every day in the year, 

But— 

That's another story! 

Oh, Summer Girl, 

Oh, fluttering vision 

Of the surfy shore ! 

Oh, symphony 

In silken shapeliness! 

Oh. Skirted Swimmer 

Of the sounding seas! 

Oh, sweet resistless 

Naiad Queen of Neptune-land ! 

Oh, Empress of the Tallyho! 



AND OTHER THINGS. 141 

Oh, Goddess of the 

White-winged yacht ! 

Oh, Sorceress of the hillside inn ! 

Oh, rare, pale 

Lily of the lakelet vale ! 

Oh, Mystic Mountain Maid, 

Sunkissed in tan 

And roseate as the dawn ! 

Oh, Hammocked Houri 

Of the halcyon days ! 

Oh, goshelmity ! 

Oh, Summer Girl, 

Why are you thus 

To be September squelched 

And leave the heart that thumps 

To throb on in its 

Throbfulness, 

With nothing, save 

The memory of a 

Glinting gleam of glory, 

To lean up against, 

Until next summer's sweet supply 

Comes into market? 

Oh, dim, delicious dream ! 

Oh, darn the luck ! 

Oh, Summer Girl, 

Au revoir! 

Oh, mamma! 



142 YAWPS 



MILK AND MUSIC. 

Prof. McConncU told the Eastern Counties' Dairy Farmers at their 
annual dinner a few days ago, that "music suitable in quality and 
administered at the right moment is a never-failing means of increasing 
the supply of cream." — The Sun. 

We hail thee, Prof. 

Nor do we scoff 
At what you rise to tell us ; 

Because we feel 

That gods reveal 
Strange things to those who' re zealous. 

We love to think 

The milk-white drink, 
The cow gives of her treasures, 

Is changed somehow, 

Despite the cow. 
By lovely Lydian measures. 

The statement, which 

You make, is rich 
In knowledge that enthuses ; 

Your fame can't fade 

Since you have made 
Milkmaids of all the Muses. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 143 

You've made of Pan, 

The goat-leg man 
Whose musical endeavor 

Was piping hot 

In wood or grot, 
A Pan of milk forever. 

These things are plain 

And much we gain 
By your profound researches, 

But something more 

From out your store 
We want by gift or purchase. 

We know that what 

You know is not 
What may not be relied on, 

And you no doubt 

Have heard about 
The tune the old cow died on ? 

We do not care 

To know the air, 
As millions have before us ; 

Nor do we, sir, 

Ask if it were 
A solo or a chorus. 



144 YAWPS 

But, tell us now, 

Did not that cow 
Succumb with sigh and sputter 

Because some maid 

Just played and played 
To make her give pure butter ? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 145 



THE ONE MAN POWER. 

He stands where the tumbling waves can't reach 
His snow white shoes on the snow white beach. 

He stands where the tumbling waves can't reach 
His sun red feet on a sun white beach. 

He walks in the promenade at eve, 

And the maidens weep lest he should leave. 

He looks at the dance and turns away, 
Because it makes him too tired to stay. 

When he goes to his various meals he hurls 
His declinations at a dozen girls. 

When he swings in a hammock half asleep, 
The girls hang round him three feet deep. 

He moves about in a kingly way. 

And who can blame him if he should say: 

''I am the only pebble on the beach!'' 

He stands where the mountain rears its top 

To the bowl of heaven, whence the new stars drop. 

10 — Yawps. 



146 YAWF3 

He moves 'midst the moss-grown rocks and rills 
And gives no heed to the ladies' wills. 

He leads the German through figures fine, 
And all his followers are feminine. 

He owns the earth in whole and part, 
And each day breaks some maiden's heart. 

He's monarch of all he surveys, and proud 
To stand on the summits and cry aloud : 
" There are no others!" 



AND OTHER THINGS. 147 



THE EXCELSIORIC 
UMP I R E. 

The crowd was gathering thick and fast 
As from the outside inside passed 
A man who stood up, strong and proud, 
And in a brave voice shouted loud, 
"Play ball!" 

His brow was sad ; his eye beneath 
Flashed like a falchion from its sheath, 
And like a silver clarion rung 
The accents of that well-known tongue ; 
"One strike!" 

In many an eye he saw the light 
That warned him how to shape the fight ; 
Beyond, the spectral bleachers shone, 
And from his lips escaped a groan ; 
"One ball!" 



148 YAWPS 

"Let up on that!" one bleacher said; 
Another yelled, "We'll punch your head!" 
And forty yelled, "Go soak your hide!" 
And loud that clarion voice replied, 
"Two balls!" 

"O, stay," a small boy guyed, "and rest 
Your weary head upon this breast." 
A tear stood in his bright blue eye, 
As now he answered with a sigh, 
"Two strikes!" 

"Beware the pine tree's withered branch; 
Beware the awful avalanche!" 
These were the grand stand's words, and he 
Braced up and shouted lustily, 

"Three strikes and out!" 

" " the bleachers yell. 

" W— 11!" 

§ H t t fi@^ t § S@* '^ * * * slam 
ttt§§1II|— xl@-?? d— n! 

!!!!!!!!!! 

There at the home plate, cold and gray, 
Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay ; 
And from the sky, serene and far, 
A voice fell like a falling star: 
"Next!" 



AND OTHER THINGS. 149 



THE THIRD PARTY 
DRIVES UP. 

I am the Third Party! 

Git on to my style 

Will you? 

And my trimmin's ? 

By Gravy, 

I don't wear no socks, 

And my galluses is 

Fastened with a lynchpin. 

But I'm cuttin' 

A wide swath 

Right down the middle of the road, 

And they can't head 

Me off, 

Nohow ! 

Mebbie I am a. sort of 

A Farmers'-Alliance-Citizens*- 

Alliance-Knights-of-Labor- 

National-Industrial-Anti- 

Monopoly-Single-Tax- 



ISO YAWPS 

Prohibition-Woman-Suffrage- 

Greenback-Free-Silver- 

Potato-Currency-Socialistic- 

Grand-Old-People's party ; 

But what if I am? 

What are they goin' 

To do about it ? 

That's what! 

By Zucks ! I have come 

To stay. 

And no razor-back Democrat, 

Nor slab-sided Republican, 

Nor ring-nose Mugwump 

Kin root me out! 

I'm a forty acre field, 

That you kin raise anything on 

From a mortgage 

To a bale of hay. 

With a wagon load 

Of dressin' throwed in, 

And I don't give a durn 

Who knows it ! 

I kin grub up a stump, 

In two shakes of a lamb's tail, 

And the old political 

Stumps has got to come, 

Ef I bust a britchin' 



AND OTHER THINGS. 151 

Doin' of it ! 

You hear me ! 

Mebbe my clo's don t fit. 

And my cow-leather brogans 

Hain't got no shine 

On to 'em, 

But that won't stop 

Ther kickin'! 

And brains ain't 

In that eend 

Neither ! 

All the American Eagle 

Has got to do in this business 

Is to set quiet on the fence 

And watch my 

Thrashin' machine go, 

When that off mule 

Gits done scratchin' 

His back up agin the fence ! 

Hand me that whip ! 

Gimme them lines ! 

Now!! 

Wo-haw ! 

Jeewillikins ! 

Gosh-all-hemlock ! 



152 



YAWPS 



LABOR DAY, i 900 

I am Labor, 

And not only is this day mine, 

But all days. 

The world began by Labor, 

And God, 

Its Mighty Maker, 

Is the Infinite Laborer, 

The same 

Yesterday, to-day and forever. 

As by Labor 

He made all things, 

So by Labor 

Do His creatures live ; 

And rest 

Is death. 

Man is the master of the world, 

And I, the master of the man. 

I bend my neck to his yoke 

And I bear his burdens ; 

I am his hewer of wood 



AND OTHER THINGS. 153 

And his drawer of water ; 

He commands 

And I obey. 

But not with slave's obedience. 

I am the greater 

Submitting to the less. 

Man chains the elements 

And drives them 

By their will, 

Not his. 

I serve 

When I may be so willed; 

But when I rule, 

I am a master and a tyrant then 

That overthrows all order, 

Crushes men, 

Starves helpless little ones. 

Wrecks homes, 

And ruthlessly tears down 

All I have builded up. 

Unreasoning 

I run my course. 

And wearied with myself 

And by myself, 

I yield again. 

I am a passion 

And a punishment ; 



IS4 



YAWPS 



A fire 

That licks its own self up ; 

A flood 

That sweeps itself into the sea ; 

An element unchained, 

Man drives by its own will, 

Not his, 

When by its will 

He has it chained again. 

I have no master save myself, 

Yet am so good a slave 

I am content 

With such bad mastery. 

This day is mine, 

And honors shown to me to-day 

Are not less mine 

On other days. 

I overcome all things 

Except myself. 

And crown all things. 

I am the solace 

And the substance of the world ; 

Man finds forgetfulness in me, 

And by me come the things 

That never are forgot ; 

Earth's progress 

And its plentitude. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 155 

Its purpose 

And its happiness, 

Its glory 

And its majesty. 

While Labor is 

So is the world, 

And when I cease to be 

The end must come 

To Maker and to made. 



156 YAWPS 



A SAGE OF CHICAGO 
REM ARKS. 

We have struck the nude in Art 

In Chicago ; 
And it gives the folks a start 

In Chicago ; 
But you bet your life we'll show 
Everybody that we know 
What's the style on Baldhead row, 

In Chicago. 

There's some less Art than Pork, 

In Chicago; 
We do not ape New York, 

In Chicago; 
But we get there just the same, 
For in Art we're known to fame, 
And the classic is our game, 

In Chicago. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 157 

It is said that we are crude 

In Chicago; 
That we're not up to the nude, 

In Chicago; 
Well, they've simply slipped a cog. 
They are off their dialogue, 
They should see a well-scraped hog, 

In Chicago. 

And the hog we think can shine 

In Chicago, 
With the human form divine, 

In Chicago. 
Yet we're willing quite to hear 
What to do, so's not to queer 
The Apollo Belvedere 

In Chicago. 

And if Venus wants to come 

To Chicago, 
And to feel herself at home 

In Chicago, 
We have only this to say: 
She can come right here and stay. 
And we'll learn to dress her way. 

In Chicago. 



158 YAWPS 

We are worshippers of Art 

In Chicago, 
We will always do our part 

In Chicago; 
And, as we want the best. 
Why, the nude goes with the rest, 
As our hogs go, when they're dressed, 

In Chicago. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 159 



RESPONSE OF THE AMERI- 
CAN PEOPLE. 

Shall we drift as we are drifting, into the vortex ? — General Patrick 
Collins of Boston, September, 1900. 

Never, General, 

Never, never, 

If we drift 

And drift forever. 

True, 

We may drift, 

As we are drifting, 

And perhaps it isn't so worse to drift, 

Seeing that while we drift 

We don't have to 

Keep a full head of steam on, 

And steam costs money ; 

But ere we reach the vortex, General, 

Ere we take the final shoot, 

We will stop our drifting, General, 

And jump off and grab a root. 

Then, O questioner 



i6o YAWPS 

Of the ages, 

Puzzler of the primal sages, 

We will make the Ship of State 

Fast to the bank. 

And, carefully 

Approaching the vortex, 

We will nab it 

By the scuff of the neck 

And the seat of the pants, 

And yank it 

Clean out of its hole. 

Yank it out bodily. General, 

And having it 

Where we can get at it right. 

We will, as the Assyrian of old 

That came down like a wolf on the fold. 

Proceed to render it 

Utterly and permanently 

Unfit for business 

By plugging it up so tight 

You couldn't drive 

An X-ray through it 

With a forty horse power 

Steam hammer. 

To know us in our hours of ease 

Uncertain, coy and hard to please, 

You'd scarce suspect it, would you, Pat, 



AND OTHER THINGS. i6i 

We'd do a vortex up like that ? 

And yet 

We would ; 

Indeed we would. 

And when we had it thoroughly plugged, 

Making it a devortexed vortex, 

So to speak, 

We'd shove it back 

Into its hole again ; 

And over the spot where the vortex 

Formerly brandished its tail 

And pawed and cavorted 

And gyrated and snorted, 

The Ship of State will sail 

With never a jar you could feel 

From the tip of her mast to her keel, 

Resplendent in her glory, 

Fit theme of song and story. 

Sail on 

Oh Ship of State, 

Sail on ; 

And, General, 

When you're not busy, 

Please trot out another vortex ; 

We've got plugs a-plenty. 



II— Yawps. 



x62 YAWPS 



SCHOOL BEGINS. 

Wow ! 

Ten million " Wows " 

Or more, 

Rise o'er the land 

From mouths 

Which since the end of June 

Have known but smiles 

And joyous shouts 

And howls and yells 

To wake the dead. 

Oh youngsters, 

You are up against it, sure ; 

You know the gall 

Of government 

Without the consent of the governed, 

And we tender you 

Our earnest sympathy. 

September is a slob, 

That's what it is, 

Or it would never loose the key 



AND OTHER THINGS. 

To lock the fetters on your limbs 

And give your brains 

A chance to boom 

When all outdoors 

Is full of sunshine 

And of fun. 

What's brains to you 

When all you want is room and time 

To let your bodies have full sway ? 

The grown-up folks may feel the need 

Of books and brains 

Because 

They're all played out, 

But you 

Are not that kind ; 

Your work and world and wisdom 

Call for different stuff. 

If it were so 

That two times two were hopscotch, 

And two into eight went fishing, 

Or dog spelled " ball," 

Or Geography were a description of the 

Earth's swimming holes, 

Or Grammar were the study of the parts 

Of a kite, 

How much more gladly would you seek 

True wisdom 



163 



1 64 YAWPS 

In the school-house walls. 

Or if the young idea were taught to shoot 

With a shotgun, 

How silently you'd " Wow " 

When sad September 

Shoved you into school. 

The grown folks ought to go to school 

Because they do not like to play. 

And you, who do, 

Should be let run 

Until you, too, have grown beyond 

The playing age 

To find the need, 

As they have, 

Of what is taught in school — 

Ain't that so ? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 165 



COMMODORE CANNON. 



Otherwise Representative Cannon, of Illinois, one time member of 
the House Committee on Naval Affairs. 



Once on a time Joe Cannon went 
From Washington to Norfolk, 

To see a battle-ship just then 
Much talked about by war-folk. 

He went by water, on a boat, 
And all the way kept talking- 

Of everything about a ship 
From mizzentop to calking. 

In fact the crowd, who heard him talk, 

And listened as he ran on, 
Thought him an expert, and they called 

Him Commodore Cannon. 

And it was wonderful to hear 

The language he paraded, 
To show the lumbering landsmen he 

Knew so much more than they did. 



1 66 YAWPS 

He talked of bowsprits on the poop, 

Of top-sails on the starboard, 
Of jib-booms on the rudder post, 

And yard-arms on the larboard. 

Indeed, there wasn't anything 

He didn't seem to know of, 
And in accordance with himself, 

It followed he would blow of 

Arrived betimes upon the scene 

He went aboard the cruiser, 
And told the Admiral on deck. 

Just how he ought to use her. 

At last he saw a hatchway, and 

For something like a minute. 
He stood beside its open mouth 

And peered profoundly in it 

And then he tried, but quite in vain. 

His wild surprise to swallow, 
And straiahteninp- up he cried aehast : 

" Good Lord, this ship is hollow." 

And this is why the naval crowd. 

And likewise all the war-folk. 
Are calling him the Commodore, 

Since he came back from Norfolk. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 167 



THE NEW YORK POLICE 
ON PARADE. 

Hail blue-clad Guardian of the Peace, 

Fit figure for Praxiteles, 

Or any ancient sculptor who 

Had nerve enough to tackle you. 

You're a bird, 

A hot bird 

With a cold night stick, 

And vice and crime and everything 

At your approach takes sudden wing. 

Oh Cop ! If one of you is great. 

What are you in the aggregate? 

Five thousand strong, 

A dazzling throng, 

As you march along; 

You're simply grand, 

The very finest in this land, 

Or any other, 

B'gosh ! 

No knights of old 



t68 yawps 

Or warriors bold 

Were half as warm 

As you are in your uniform. 

We point at you with pride, we do, 

From Ballywack to Ballyhoo, 

And as we gaze on you we know 

We're safe from every kind of foe; 

The man who sells us demon rum, 

When Sunday with its rest has come, 

The cuss who wins our confidence, 

The lulling fiend who dopes our sense, 

The burglar who breaks in to steal, 

The butch' who sells us early veal. 

The cow that gives down Croton milk. 

The shark whose business is to bilk, 

The gentleman who runs a game, 

The glad-hand chap who knows our name. 

The modest cabman charging what 

Is pretty sure to swipe the pot, 

And forty dozen others who 

Turn pale and tall at sight of you. 

Oh Cop! 

You've got the drop 

On crime; 

And vice will climb 

A tree 

Rather than go up against thee, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 169 

Behold, Oh, G. O. P. ! 

(Guardian Of die Peace, in other words) 

The thousands and los of looos 

Who come forth in gala attire 

To feast their hungry eyes 

Upon your manly beauty on exhibition ; 

List to the melodious measures of music 

Tooting their martial strains 

In your honor ; 

See the flags flying, 

The pennants and the banners ; 

Hear the loud hosanners 

Of congregated, cheering citizens, 

And swell up with pride. 

But don't bust wide open 

In your triumphant elation. 

We can stand the town being wide open, 

And rather like it. 

But a wide open policeman 

Is too different. 

Throw out your chests. 

Hold up your chins. 

Pull down your vests. 

Stick out your shins 

In one two order ; left, left, left ; 

What would we be were we bereft 

Of you, Oh sleepless watcher that 



I70 YAWPS 

Most always knows where you are at, 

And also knows 

A lot of other things than those, 

And never says a word. 

You are a bird all right, 

But not a parrot by a d. s. 

Gee whiz! 

What a fearful and wonderful thing 

A policeman is. 

However, Cop, 

We must stop, 

But as for you : 

Go ahn, 

Go ahn, now; 

See? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 171 



THE LANGUAGE OF 
PROGRESS. 



On the other hand, we may be sure that the United Slates will enter 
the struggle with that pertinacious energy which is one of tlie standing 
evidences of the community of blood, origin, and temper with ourselves. 
— London Times. 



Ay, there, ye Englishmen who know 

The temper of our kind, 
It is not meant that we who go 

Should fail or fall behind ; 
There is that in the common blood 
Which cannot be misunderstood, 

And shows to them not blind. 

We stand for progress ; in the light 
Of modern things we make 

No cruel, conquest-seeking fight. 
But fearlessly we take 

The cause of Cuba as our own, 

And setting it against a throne, 
Ask justice — that alone. 



175 YAWPS 

In other times the tyrant might 

Nay, did, assert that he 
Held by divinity the right 

To let no man be free 
Except himself; and his command 
Was God and law to all his land 

And outward to his sea. 

But these are new times ; in the years 

Now come, a gospel-song 
Has sung away the law, and tears 

Are shed no more, and wrong 
Has given place to justice, and 
A fetterless and firm-set hand 

Moves all the world alonof. 

And hearken, Englishmen, the song 
That sets the right above the wrong 
Is writ in English, good and strong, 
In simple English, strong and good, 
That cannot be misunderstood. 



AND OTHER THINGS. i73 



COUNT WALDERSEE'S 
COMMAND. 

Uncle Sam to Kaiser William. 

Your Majesty, herewith accept 

My cordial unity 
With you, in placing in command 

Your own Count VValdersee ; 

A soldier, brave as ever led 

The soldiers of his land ; 
A General, fit in every way 

To take supreme command. 

The Allies, in a common cause 

And led by Waldersee, 
Will pile the ground with China's slain, 

And march to victory. 

Uncle Sam to His Own People. 
Say, Friends and Fellow Citizens, 

I've just sent word to Bill 
That Waldersee as Allied Boss 
Will suit us fit to kill. 



174 YAWPS 

I've given him a lively graft, 

A kind of pipey dream, 
About the Count and how well fixed 

He is to be supreme. 

He'll have command of all our troops, 

But all the others, too ; 
And all the Allies must obey 

And do as he says do. 

But don't let that bother you, my friends, 
He's not so darned supreme 

In running things out there to suit 
Himself, as it would seem. 

Of course the Kaiser thinks he is, 

And maybe he does, too, 
But that's no sign, as you will see, 

When I explain to you. 

The fact is, gents, we rule the roost, 

I mean Americans, 
And though Count Waldie is on deck 

He doesn't shape his plans. 

Because, by Zucks ! he's got a wife, 

A lady, too, of birth ; 
And was there ever married man 

Who wholly owned the earth 'f 



AND OTHER THINGS. 17. 

I guess not ; and that wife of his 

Was born in Yankee land, 
And though he wears the epaulets 

She's in supreme command. 

In other words, while it might seem 

The Germans are on top. 
The really truly fact is that 

The Yankees have the drop. 

Which shows you, fellow citizens, 

That as a diplomat, 
And soldier, too, your Uncle Sam 

Knows just where he is at. 



176 YAWPS 



THE DISCOVERY OF 
AMERICA. 

Upon the tropic sea 

The soft October night lay silently 

And one by one the little stars 

Shot silver bars 

Across the glassy greenness of the deep, 

Lying in long, low, lazy rolls asleep ; 

Around the limitless expanse 

Of sea and sky 

The twinkling lights and shadows fly 

And dance. 

And hide again till every spark 

Is hidden in the dark. 

Like sceptres floating in the air, 

Wings idly flapping, and their spare 

Arms stretched to find 

What they had left the world behind 

To search for, stood 

Three ships that made the solitude 



AND OTHER THINGS. 177 

More lonely ; they 

Had lost their way 

Amid those sapphire seas 

And every gentle breeze 

Was as a fierce, insatiate gale 

To sweep them far beyond the pale 

Of earthly knowledge, and 

To wreck them in some unknown land. 

Men paced the decks affrighted ; they 

Had trembled when the light of day 

Went out, and night 

Came with its gruesome light 

To bring them ghosts 

From dead men's coasts, 

And shores on which had trod 

Only the foot of God. 

And terror seized them ; sore afraid, 

They cursed sometimes 

And sometimes prayed, 

But never stayed 

Their onward course. 

A force. 

Greater than all their power, 

Hour after hour 

Held each one to his quest. 

Onward, still onward to the West ! 

Columbus, he 

I J.— yawps- 



178 YAWPS 

The Monarch of the Sea 

On this October night 

In the dim light 

Of his cabin sat still 

As Fate, then with that masterful will 

Of his, he rose and in a loud, 

Commanding voice, to the crowd 

Of superstitious sailors on the deck 

He said : "By Zucks 

If some of you fellows 

Don't discover America 

P d q 

I'll do it myself! 

See?" 

And the next day 

It was 

Discovered ! 

Hurrah for Chris ! 



AND OTHER THINGS. i79 



T H AN KSGI VI N G. 

Thanks ! 

Not such as swept along 

By the full tide of power, 

The conqueror leads 

To crimson glory and undying fame, 

But earnest, unaffected, 

Plain, old-fashioned 

Thanks, 

Warranted heart wide 

And all gratitude, 

Thanks for that common possession 

Most folks forget to think of 

When they go grunting around, 

Grumbling and complaining 

And kicking at 

The Good Lord, 

To-wit : 

Life! 

Just ordinary living life, 



i8o YAWPS 

With a blue sky above us, 

And a glad, green earth 

Under our feet ; 

With friends enough left over 

To send cheerily back to us 

The greetings we give to them 

With each new day. 

Isn't that a whole lot 

To be thankful for ? 

What if we don't own the earth 

And keep a back yard full of stars, 

And ride to business in our own 

Private car, 

And eat pie 

Twenty-one times a week, 

With turkey and celery and oysters 

On the side ; 

Or never have an ache or pain, 

Or never know what sorrow is. 

Or never walk in the shadow, 

Or never carry a heavy heart. 

Or never kiss cold lips, 

Or never shed a scalding tear, 

Or never know what disappointment is, 

Or never feel the chill of poverty, 

Or never have a friend betray, 

Or never get a thousand million things 



AND OTHER THINGS. i8i 

We think we ought to have ! 

Who are we that we 

Should refuse to return 

Thanks to a Beneficent Being, 

Because we don't have 

Everything we want, 

And a thousand thing-s 

That a thousand people 

Just as good as we are, don't have ? 

We ought to be thankful 

We are not that kind ! 

And if we were that kind, 

We ought to be thankful that 

Time is still allowed us 

In which we may reform 

And depart from the error of our ways. 

And life is only one 

Of the many things we ought to be 

Thankful for ! 

Why, friends and fellow travelers 

Toward the Final Accomplishment, 

A list of the things we may be 

Thankful for 

Reaches from the cradle to the grave 

And unrolls itself on the 

Green fields of eternal glory. 

Therefore, on this 



i82 YAWPS 

Thanksgiving Day, 

Let us all give thanks heartily, 

And if we can't do it heartily, 

Let us do it as heartily as we can, 

Let us thank the Good Lord 

For what we are, 

And be twice as thankful 

For what we are not. 

For all of us sincerely hope 

That we are not as bad as we might be. 

And we would not thank anybody 

Who would say we were. 

So now around the cheerful board, 

Let all of us in full accord 

Give grateful thanks unto the Lord — 

A very kind and gracious Lord, 

Who gives us more than our reward. 



AND OTHER THINGS. 183 



TO THE LVth congress, 

Oh, Congress, in your 

Hours of ease, 

Do something-, 

If you please, to please 

And show us that 

Our confidence 

In you, which always 

Is immense, 

Is not misplaced. 

Those trivial things. 

Finance and laws 

For revenue, need scarcely 

Cause 

You great concern. 

The question, which 

Will make the country 

Great and rich. 

Is to your action 

Wholly new, 

And unconsidered 



1 84 YAWPS 

Hitherto. 

It deals in futures ; 
Shall we take 
And hold for good 
The wondrous stake 
That we have won, 
By blood and pain, 
From withered, wizened, 
Wretched Spain? 
Shall we, who stand 
For newer thing-s. 
For all that God-sent 
Freedom brings. 
For equal rights. 
For human weal, 
For nobler aims, 
For laws that heal 
The wounds of tyrants, 
And for what 
In all essentials 
Spain was not — 
Say, Legislators, 
Say, shall we 
Shirk this 
Responsibility, 
And helpless leave 
The millions who 



AND OTHER THINGS. 185 

Have come to us, 

And look to you 

For that which they 

Can hope to have 

No other way? 

Are we to falter 

In the trust 

Imposed upon us? 

Shall the lust 

And greed of tyrants 

Be not stayed 

By sacrifices 

We have made ? 

These are the questions: 

Shall we take 

And hold for good 

The wondrous stake ? 

And holding it 

Add to our land 

A glory that shall 

Make it grand, 

As other nations 

Are not? We 

Give to the people 

Liberty. 

This is our duty 

To the world; 



t86 YAWPS 

For this our Flag 
Was first unfurled. 
Now shall it float, 
The Freedom's Flag, 
Or hang, a limp, 
Dishonored rag ? 



AND OTHER THINGS. 187 



MERRY CHRISTMAS. 

And Christmas! 

What a day it is, 

With earth and air full of the fizz 

And sparkle of champagne ; 

And yet a better thing than that, 

For all may take it, 

Free as air, 

When Christmas cheer is everywhere, 

Not quite as much to some, 

Perhaps, 

As unto others ; not all of us 

May have the "snaps" 

Of this good world of ours ; 

And yet, he is unworthy who will let 

The shadows fall on him 

Or his, 

When Christmas time is what it is, 

And loses much of happiness, 

Because it happens he has less 

Than others have. Gadzooks ! Perhaps 



i88 ' YAWPS 

They'd like the chance to swap their "snaps" 

For his ; and glad could they arrange 

With this same coveter to change. 

But even they should not repine; 

The rich may let their treasure shine 

So that although their lot be sad, 

They may be able to make glad 

Those less unhappy ; those — but why 

Bring in the semblance of a sigh 

To mar the Christmas song ? 

At Christmas there is nothing wrong ; 

An ache, a debt, a heavy heart 

Must be considered as a part 

Of Christmas time ; a spot to make 

The light a brighter radiance take. 

There is enough for all ; God gives 

To every human thing that lives, 

Some chance at gladness ; something to 

Transfer in His own way the blue 

That's in your lives into your sky 

Till every heavy cloud rolls by ; 

And Christmas is the time. Come all 

Look up, look up ; there is no pall 

Of gray 

And blackness hung to-day 

Above the Merry Christmas way. 

For in your hearts must roses bloom 



AND OTHER THINGS. 189 

In Christmas color and perfume. 
Divide your blessings and your cares, 
Give half of yours ; take half of theirs ; 
Forget the rest. What odds if, what 
You think you want, you haven't got! 
There may be others ; can it be 
In this you have no company? 
Ah, no, a million others would 
Be something other if they could. 
But let that go ; there's plenty yet 
To make you happy and forget. 
Brace up, stand up, look up, and cheer 
For Christmas — one time of the year 
When merry bells shall gayly ring 
And all the world shall laugh and sing. 



xgo 



YAWPS 



THE SUPERFLUOUS SPEAK. 

There are 25,000 more women than men in Greater New York. 
— Census, 1900. 

Well, 

We don't care ; 

Men are horrid things anyway. 

And the more of us 

The better. 

How good it is 

To know that we 

Are always heart-whole. 

Fancy free. 

No galling chain 

Of wedded bliss 

Can brine us such 

Delight as this. 

We are perfectly independent, 

And what's ours 

Is ours. 

And just to think ; 

It isn't until we are out of school, 



AND OTHER THINGS. 191 

Or our older sisters 

Are married off, 

Or somebody with money 

Comes along, 

But forever and ever and ever. 

Oh, joy beyond expressing, 

Oh, bliss, serene. 

Of wandering in meadows 

Of everlasting green. 

Ours is a protracted season 

Of perpetual peace, 

With never a sock to darn, 

Never a shirt to mend. 

Never a man to sit up for 

Till 3 A. M. 

Never a cent to beg for. 

Never a husband to thank, 

Never a cook to plead with, 

Never a baby to spank. 

Isn't it perfectly grand ? 

Spinsters by right of birth, 

We are the only real 

Birds of Freedom, 

And we rise and scream 

In a manner that makes 

The Eagle's feathers curl, 

And lifts the Starry Banner of the Free, 



192 



YAWPS 



Clean off the end of the flag-pole. 

We are the stuff 

That new women are made of, 

And although we do not vote, 

Or wear whiskers, 

&c. 

We yield our necks 

To the yoke of no tyrant man, 

And we acknowledge no superiors 

No lords of creation. 

As run the rivers to the sea 

Through placid fields that lie 

Along their cool and quiet banks 

Beneath a restful sky ; 

As peaceful as the patient stars 

That light the sleeping skies, 

Our lives, as undisturbed as they, 

Move on to Paradise, 

Where, according to 

The Good Book, 

There is no marrying 

Or giving in marriage. 

And then whose turn will it be 

To give somebody 

The everlasting ha ha ? 

So there. 



